


Godchild

by TheArtOfDodging



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Body Horror, Canon Compliant, Carver's main personality trait is being sick of Hawke's bullshit, Cthulhu Mythos, Dalish Lore, F/M, Gen, Hawke is a mage but likes to pretend she's a rogue, If You Squint - Freeform, Kinda, Lovecraftian, Mage Hawke - Freeform, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, The Hawkes are demigods but also fucking wierd, no beta we die like men, this is also a sometimes comedy because I am incapable of not writing comedy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:14:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26050978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheArtOfDodging/pseuds/TheArtOfDodging
Summary: Malcolm Hawke is the son of a human woman and a creature older and wider than the Fade. What does that mean for his children?_________________The Hawke siblings aren't entirely human. This is what that means.
Relationships: Fenris/Female Hawke, Leandra Hawke/Malcolm Hawke
Comments: 11
Kudos: 79





	1. Beginnings, and an ending

The first time Leandra lays eyes on Malcolm Hawke she gasps. If asked later, she would have said something about how it had been because she had never seen such a handsome man, or perhaps that it was love at first sight. 

_This is a lie._

When Leandra first lays eyes on Malcolm Hawke she gasps ( _recoils_ ) because, for a split second, she could have sworn that he was shining brighter than the sun, that he had wings, that he was a snake, coiled to attack, a wolf bearing its teeth. That he had a shape ever-changing and very, very much not human. It’s all gone by the time she blinks, and she’s left with a handsome, and decidedly human young man who is busy smiling rakishly at the other noble ladies. Leandra searches the faces of the people in the crowd, someone must have seen it. But even the templars, normally so stern and vigilant, seemed charmed by the mage, smiling and laughing along with his jokes. Not a demon then. Leandra does not know a lot about possession and blood magic, but she does know that the templars would have noticed if a demon in a human suit was drinking wine right in front of them.

Like he knows he’s being watched, the handsome man turns away from the fawning noblewomen and locks eyes with Leandra. He smiles at her like they share a secret.

It is curiosity that makes her evade her parents watchful eyes to meet him on the balcony. Because Leandra is so, so _bored_ with everything. She’s bored with her pointless studies. Bored with the balls and the needlepoint and endless gossip about who wore what at the Viscount's feast last spring. Even if she never meets him again, talking to a man who is not a man will probably be the most interesting thing that has ever happened to her. 

“Who are you?” Leandra asks the man who is not a man, the second they are out of ear shot from the other guests. The mage gives her a delighted smile. Like no one has ever asked him that before.. In the moonlight his shadow is far larger than any humans’.  
“They call me Hawke, here. But I could be just Malcolm to you, if you wanted.” This is not a lie, but it is also not the answer to her question. 

Leandra kisses him for the first time only a minute later. 

She’s not sure what she intended this to be. Perhaps it should have been a passionate, forbidden fling, to experience a little adventure before she marries the respectable nobleman her parents have chosen for her. But by the third time Leandra sneaks out to meet Malcolm Hawke in a dark corner of Lowtown, she is already head over heels in love with him. 

Leandra’s favourite tutor had once told her of the Fade. Had told her that there were other worlds, stacked on top of each other as intimately like the fine silk layers of her ballgown. Those with magic can peer through the thin layer of this world into others - into the past, into the future, into worlds where gods and demons roam. This is what it feels like to look at Malcolm. Like she, for a split second, is allowed a peak into a completely different universe. There is magic in the Amell line, Leandra is well aware, but that does not explain why no one else sees what she sees when she looks at Malcolm Hawke. 

Because Leandra cannot for the life of her understand how anyone could mistake Malcolm Hawke for a human. He doesn’t look right, doesn’t feel right, doesn’t sound right. Everytime Leandra looks away she forgets exactly what he looks like, and when she turns back he always seems a little different, like he can’t remember what he is supposed to look like. 

It surprises Leandra how little she cares. 

Malcolm is a prisoner in that damned Circle, and yet he is the most free person Leandra has ever met. He is free with his love too. Offering Leandra his heart on a silver platter like it is a small thing. Like it had always been hers. Being loved by Malcolm Hawke is like being loved by the sun. All-encompassing and ever present.

Leandra is the one who first suggests running away together. Malcolm is hesitant, doesn’t want her to leave her gilded cage to live a life forever on the run. 

A few weeks later she spends an entire morning throwing up in a chamber pot, and realises that she hasn’t bled in two months. _Well no going back now, she thinks_. 

__________________________________________

Maurevar Carver is a templar, and he is loyal to the cause. _This is a lie._

Maurevar Carver knows that Hawke is a good man, and he does not believe that caging good men, that keeping them from the ones they love, is the solution. _This is true._

Maurevar Carver knows that the creature calling itself Hawke harbours a chaos inside himself the like of which The Order of Templars has never seen, and nothing will stop him from re-uniting with the woman he loved. _This is also true._

By the time the couple leave Kirkwall, Leandra is already pregnant. Maurevar prays to the Maker that the child inherits Malcolm’s goodness as well as his chaos. 

Almost 30 years later, Maurevar Carver has long since quit the Templars and settled down in Wycome, when he hears a rumour about how a young woman with dark curls and blood on her face defeated the Arishok in single combat and saved Kirkwall from a sure massacre. A young woman who calls herself _Hawke_. That night, Maurevar Carver prays to the Maker for the first time in a very long time.  
____________________________________________

They barely have time to settle in Ferelden before Marian is born. And she is the loveliest baby Malcolm has ever seen. Leandra agrees wholeheartedly, but sometimes she looks down at the small, pink bundle in her arms and wonders how much of this child will be human and how much will be something else.

“I know, Leandra. I know” Malcolm says like he’s read her mind. “I will deal with it. I’ll teach her everything I can. About control. About hiding.”

“You couldn’t hide from me” Leandra points out.

“Ah, but perhaps I didn’t want to” Malcolm answers. _This is at least partially true._

“Did you have other children?” She asks . “Before you came to Kirkwall? Before we met?” She knows that most mages aren’t allowed to have children, but Malcolm isn’t most mages. Malcolm Hawke is also older than he looks. A lot older. When they’d first met he claimed to be just a handful years older than herself. But he slips up a lot. Especially as the years pass. He forgets that Ferelden isn’t a part of the Tevinter imperium. Thinks that the Dales is still an elven kingdom. He talks of ancient battles and half forgotten kings like he was there, like he met them personally. He always corrects himself quickly. Makes a joke about his overactive imagination. He could have sired children many times over in all of that time. He hasn’t though. When she had asked Malcolm had laughed like this was the most absurd thing he’d ever heard.

“No.” He’d said. “I never wanted any until I met you.”  
__________________________________________________________________

The children grow up to be perfectly normal, thank you very much. Or at least as normal as the offspring of an apostate and a former noblewoman can be. They spill their porridge, skin their knees and try to wrestle the dog, all of which seem like perfectly normal child things to do. Sometimes Leandra can almost forget that there is a part of them that is older and wider than the sky. 

They don’t talk about it, not really. About what Malcolm really is. Not until Malcolm says he’s going on a trip to Denerim and he’ll be back in a week. He stumbles back three weeks later with black corruption spreading in his veins and a desperate look on his face.  
“You know. You always known, haven’t you?” he asks her in between coughing fits.

“Know what, dear?”

“You know that I’m different. That I’m not entirely human. Not really. You knew the first time you saw me, I could see it in your face. But you weren’t scared of me, not even back then”. Malcolm smiles fondly at the memory.  
“What are you then, Malcolm? A demon? A god?” Leandra says jokingly.

“Not me, no” He breathes a small laugh. “But I think...I think my father might have been.” It doesn’t occur to Leandra until much later that Malcolm never specified which one his father was.

“I didn’t know him.” Malcolm continued. “ And I only knew my mother for a few years, but I’m pretty sure she was human. The templars never noticed because I am not possessed, no monster has invaded my body. This is me. It is a natural part of me. People notice that I’m different sometimes, but very few know why”.

“Why are you telling me this now?” Leandra asks. This is the most forthcoming Malcolm has ever been about anything, and it makes her suspicious.

“I’m not going to get better- no, please listen - it’s the Blight. The Blight is coming and I thought I could stop it, but I can’t. I tried, and instead it gave me this” He gestures to the black veins that have started climbing their way up his chest, slowly choking the life out of him.

“It’s fine, really it is. I have lived a very, very long life. and I am tired. I’m not scared of dying, but I am scared of leaving you behind, my love. And I am scared of leaving three children behind with powers that they will never understand”.

When they bury the love of her life Leandra looks through her tears at her eldest daughter. Marian is _shining._

Eight months after Malcolm’s death, Leandra comes home to find a note from Carver proclaiming that he has run off to join the Imperial Army at Ostagar. Leandra cries, and Bethany lets out a string of curses that no one even knew she had in her vocabulary. Marian is quiet, like she always is when she’s upset. She packs a bag, slings her hunting bow around her shoulder and announces that she’s going to bring him back.

She keeps her promise only two weeks later, when they both come barreling through Lothering with a horde of darkspawn at their heels. 

_And they all run._


	2. The Destruction of Lothering

It’s almost morning when they meet their first darkspawn. They had been on the move all night, not daring to stop for more than a few minutes. It is an ugly, snarling mess, but it is also eerily human, and Marian is surprised by how hard it is to kill. It becomes easier by the minute, though.

By the second day, it’s as easy as breathing. 

One of the first things their father had taught Marian was how to pretend. How to pretend to be smaller, weaker, duller than she actually were. But now she’s allowing herself to let go, just a little, to skirt the edges of her human shape. She can tell that Carver is doing the same, his shape going just a little unfocused with every swing of his sword. Bethany, always the most human of them, is having trouble keeping up. 

Marian pulls at the veil, drawing out the power and forcing it to take shape. _You think monsters scare me?_ A wall of flame erupts from the ground between them and the small group of darkspawn that have been pursuing them. She can hear flesh charr and blood boil. _I’ll show you a monster._

_I’ll show you all._

___________________________________________________________________

Aveline doesn’t notice that they have company until a ball of fire explodes in the face of a darkspawn. Later, she’ll chalk it up to being a bit busy at the time, what with trying to not get killed by darkspawn and simultaneously trying to keep Wesley conscious. An invisible force slams into the darkspawn, knocking most of them to the ground, and another warrior joins the fray to hack the distracted creatures to pieces. A shimmering barrier closes around Aveline, and she realises it’s the work of a second mage, hovering a few steps back. At literally any other time she would have been wary that at least two of their rescuers were mages, but right now all she thinks is _Thank the Maker._

The mage and warrior maneuver around each other with an ease that tells Aveline they’ve done this before, and between them they make short work of the rest of their enemies. Aveline breathes a sigh of relief. 

“I bet you’re glad we showed up”. The mage is a young woman, with dark hair and an easy grin. The warrior rolls his eyes behind her back. 

“Apostate, keep your distance” Wesley spits. 

‘’Oh, a templar. Great” the warrior says. _Oh Maker, they were practically children._

“I thought all the templars had abandoned Lothering”, the second girl says, the accusation clear in her voice.

“He’s not from Lothering, I would have remembered”, the first mage says. She gives Wesley a inquisitive look. 

“I can assure you that my children won’t cause you harm”. An older woman joins them, and her children form a protective semi-circle around her. 

“The darkspawn is clear in their intent, but a mage is always unknown” Wesleys snarls, and grabs for his blade, but his hands are slippery with his own blood. The warrior puts a hand on his own sword in response, but the mage slaps his hand away.

"Templar or not, that man could barely kill a nug right now. Let alone anyone of us," she says. 

“They did save us, dear,” Aveline says. “We can hate each other all we like as soon as we are clear of the darkspawn”. 

“Ah, I think some introductions are in order. I’m Hawke, and this is my sister Bethany, my mother Leandra and Carver-” 

‘’Why do you get to be Hawke? We’re both named Hawke, Marian” the warrior named Carver interrupts.

“Because I’m the oldest, and therefore the future master of the house obviously”. 

“Oh yes, I had forgotten about the vast estate that the Hawke name comes with."

“It still counts!”

“Could you please not fight right now?” Bethany says in a tone that makes it clear they have had this conversation many times before.

“We should move out” Aveline interjects. Bethany gives her a grateful look. It seems they’re both used to playing peacemaker. 

“Yes, we should. Let’s focus on surviving the darkspawn right now, and then you can try to smite me all you want later?” Hawke tells Wesley in a patronising voice, like she’s talking to an unruly child. Carver hides a snicker in a cough. “You can’t smite Bethany though. It’d be like smiting a kitten. And then we’ll have to have words about it.”

Aveline wonders if Hawke is all youthful bravado, or if there is something else that makes her think she can talk to a templar like that and get away with it. 

She doesn’t have to wonder for long, though. The siblings prove to be highly capable fighters, way too capable for the small town farmers they claim to be. 

Hawke is nothing like any of the other mages Aveline has ever met. They were cowed, frightened things who only used their power under strictly controlled circumstances and the watchful eyes of templars. Hawke, on the other hand, is a force of nature. She pulls fire, ice, lightning from the air faster than the eye can follow and moves through the foes with the relentless force of a tidal wave. But no matter how fast she moves, Carver is one step ahead, parrying blows and blades until Hawke can ignite the enemy from within. Bethany hangs back, keeping up shields and protecting their mother. It seems a comfortable pattern, like the roles they always play. 

But none of that matters when a huge ogre. bigger than any of them has ever seen before, grabs Bethany in its large hands and throws her to the ground with a sickening crack. 

___________________________________________________________________

She is soaring high above the Korcari forest when she feels it. It feels like a star collapsing in on itself. Like a silent scream trying to rip the fabric of reality apart. Flemeth makes an abrupt turn, and studies the burning landscape below her.

She finds the origin of the silent scream at the cliffs a few miles from the coast. A small group of humans is squaring off against a horde of darkspawn. The ground around them is already littered with the corpses of darkspawn, a large ogre amongst them. _Not your average humans then._

The humans feel somehow familiar, but dragon eyes are different, and their faces are distorted and unfocused. She’s going to have to change her form. 

_Oh, well. She can always kill them if they turn out to be uninteresting._

When the rest of the darkspawn are burnt to a crisp, Flemeth changes form and finds two pairs of shocked, golden eyes staring back at her. The kind of golden eyes that, up until now, had only been in the possession of herself, Morrigan, and one other person. 

_Oh, Malcolm. What have you done?_

Because the children are unmistakably his, it is obvious not only from their facial features, but also from the way Flemeth can feel their souls shine just a little brighter than other humans. 

Flemeth sighs. 

Perhaps she should have killed Malcolm the first time they met, an eternity ago. Having too many of their kind rattling around in the world had always been a recipe for disaster. The last time there was more than one of their children in the world at once Andraste had raised an army to overthrow an empire, and had set the world on fire in the process. 

But Flemeth _(Mythal)_ had been so, so lonely, and weak, and it had been quite nice to have someone else in the world who was kin when all of the others had been imprisoned in the Fade. Someone who understood, at least a little, what it was like to be a God. And Malcolm Hawke had always been a funny bastard, more interested in exploring and drinking than leading armies. 

“Well, well, well. What have we here? It used to be we never got any visitors at all in the Wilds, but now it seems they arrive in hordes’’ Flemeth says. 

“You...you can turn into a dragon” one of the children says. The girl with a staff in her hand. Oh, and of course she’s a mage too. Gods help the templars if she ever ends up in a Circle. 

“Perhaps I am a dragon” Flemeth responds. The two children exchange looks. Behind them, a woman with greying hair is leaning over a body, and Flemeth understands what drew her here. 

“Bethany...our sister, she got attacked by the ogre” Hawke explains. “I- we killed it but it was too late”. The grey haired woman must be their mother then, the one Malcolm had loved enough to do something as stupid as sire children. Flemeth thinks she looks perfectly ordinary. It seems Malcolm went a bit soft in his final years. 

“If you’re fleeing the darkspawn, you should know that you are heading in the wrong direction.”

“So you’re just going to leave us here?” The boy hisses. Flemeth studies the pair. The boy’s eyes are red with fresh tears, and the girl keeps clenching and unclenching her hands like she’s feeling for claws she doesn’t have.

Flemeth contemplates leaving them, and letting the darkspawn deal with the problem for her. Malcolm’s children or not, they can clearly be killed with enough effort. The broken body in front of her is proof of that.

But she can feel a storm brewing in Thedas, and the oldest one has destiny written all over her. She has a part to play in what’s coming, and Flemeth could sure use an ally or two when the push finally comes. 

When she hears that they’re heading to Kirkwall, Flemeth smiles. _Of course they are._

___________________________________________________________________

Aveline spends the rest of the journey in a haze, barely registering anything until she’s suddenly standing at the port in Gwaren. There is a ship that could take them to Kirkwall, but it is already packed to the brim with refugees with no room for more. 

Aveline watches Hawke exchange words with the captain, who seems unlikely to change his mind, but then Hawke puts a hand on his shoulder and smiles, and suddenly the captain remembers that there is in fact just enough space for four more people and weren’t they lucky to have arrived just in time? 

And just like that, Aveline finds herself squeezed into a cargo hold with about a hundred other refugees, heading to a city where she knew no one. She would survive, Aveline always survived, but she wished she didn’t have to do it alone. That she wouldn’t have to do it without Wesley. 

Avleine hasn’t cried yet. She feels like she should, but she also feels like the dirty, cramped cargo hold is the last possible place on earth where she could do that.

“Hey” a soft voice says. Hawke sits down on the straw-covered floor next to her, close enough to knock the shoulders together. Hawke has cried though, Aveline can tell by her red-rimmed eyes and the way she keeps sniffling.

For a long time, they sit just like that, leaning on each other in silence. 

Finally Hawke speaks again. “I know we’ve just met, but we could be your family for a bit. If you want to.” she says in a small, hopeful voice. “It’s what Bethany would have wanted too.”

"I'd like that too", Aveline says. Hawke leans closer into Aveline's side, and drops her head onto her shoulder. Hawke's hair is still filthy with darkspawn blood, but Aveline doesn't move. They sit just like that for a long time, and when they move apart Aveline's lapel is wet with tears. 

A lifetime later, when Hawke is ten years older and larger than life, Aveline will still sometimes look at her and see the young girl who cried on her shoulder. She doesn’t think she’ll ever not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *casually implies Andraste was the child of an elven god*


	3. The Greatest Story Ever Told

The first time Varric met Hawke she was breaking up a gang fight. By talking. 

“Now I understand that you are all upset,” Hawke said with a winning smile.“But surely violence should be the very last option”. 

She was the only thing separating two heavily armed groups from clashing. You could already hear the clash of steel, smell the blood in the air. But Varric was getting ahead of himself.

Literally anyone else would have been looking for their own teeth in the gutter by now, but the heavily armed thugs were actually listening to her. Possibly only out of shock, but still. 

Several other people had stopped, and were watching the altercation with unabashed interest. The residents of Lowtown liked to take their entertainment wherever they could find it, and this seemed like it had potential of becoming a good show. 

“This is none of your business, woman” the leader of one of the groups snarled. He went by the name “The Bastard”, not as a comment on his parents marital status, but because he was a bit of a bastard. Varric was pretty sure he was part of the Dog Lords. Fairly new in Kirkwall’s world of crime, but a very real threat all the same.

“I think you’ll find that it is my business, Coryn”, Hawke replied. The Bastard blanched in horror. No one knew his real name. He was pretty sure his own mother didn’t know his real name. 

Hawke continued. “You see, I am a proud resident of this very neighbourhood, and I sure would like to keep the murdering to a minimum. It upsets mother, you see, and bloodstains are very hard to wash out of the stairs.”

“Don’t you work for Athenril?” the leader of the other gang, a dwarven woman with Carta tattoos, asked suspiciously. 

Hawke beamed at her. “Oh, you know her too? Lovely woman, isn’t she?”

The gangs exchanged looks. Athenril was well-known in the seedier parts of Kirkwall, and although many words could be used to describe her, _lovely_ was not one of them. 

“So anyway, I¨d appreciate it if you could ta- what have you got there, Brenn?” Hawke said. One of the dwarves froze.

“A...a smoke bomb?” Brenn said sheepishly.

“Well, did you bring enough for everyone?”

Brenn had the look of someone who’d just walked face-first into a brick wall. “...No?”.

“Well, then put it away. There’s a good lad.” 

The leaders of the two groups exchanged a horrified look. They were used to people trying to stop them, obviously. Some cried and begged, some yelled, and a fair amount tried to fight back. But no one had ever tried to talk to them in the vaguely patronising manner of a schoolteacher breaking up a schoolyard scuffle before, and no one was entirely sure how to deal with it. Sure, attacking Hawke and commencing the fight was an option, but it seemed somehow _unsportsmanlike_. And something about Hawke’s open, honest smile made the more seasoned gang members feel unsettled. No one could afford to be this polite, this well-meaning, without some very heavy backup. 

“Who is _that_?” Varric asked a human who was leaning against a wall, watching the proceedings with an air of vigilant boredom. 

The young man let out a long-suffering sigh. “That’s Hawke” he said, and gave his sister an exasperated look. Marian had recently attempted to cut her own hair off with a dagger, possibly for the drama of it all, and the result was a chin-length halo of curls that gave the impression that she’d just been dragged through a hedge. It somehow didn’t decrease her gravitas, although Carver felt that it absolutely should. 

Varric studied the man closer. Dark hair, high cheekbones, pale skin. Hmm.

“Do I detect a familial relation?”

“She’s my sister” the young man said through gritted teeth, like it caused him physical pain to admit. 

The two gangs had, apparently, decided to live to fight another day, and were now slowly backing away from each other, whilst they exchanged threatening looks that made it clear they would kill anyone who dared to speak of this again. 

“That was quite a feat”, Varric said as Hawke came ambling up to them. 

“Oh, they’re all good chaps deep down. You just have to make them see reason”, Hawke replied. Varric searched her face for the sarcasm he felt must be there, but couldn’t find any. Oh, this was getting better and better. 

___________________________________________________________________

The second time Varric met Hawke was when he found the siblings arguing with Bartrand about the Deep Roads expedition. It didn’t particularly surprise Varric when Bartrand took one look at the pair and dismissed them as common opportunistic mercenaries. Bartrand had never had an eye for talent.

Varric caught up to them in the courtyard outside.

“Varric Tethras, at your service. I apologize for Bartrand, He wouldn’t know an opportunity if it hit him square in the jaw.”

“Oh, we’ve met before haven’t we?” Hawke said. The fact that she recognized him from a minute long encounter four months earlier was impressive. Varric rarely met anyone who was as good at faces and names as himself. 

“Yes, briefly. But let’s just say you made enough of an impression that I’ve kept an eye out for you ever since. The name Hawke is becoming well-known in certain circles, several of which I have a vested interest in..”

“Aaw, it’s not everyday someone likes us enough to have us followed” Hawke’s brother interjected. “You’re going awfully far out of your way just to hire another guard, don’t you think?”

“Oh, Carver. Not everyone has an ulterior motive you know” Hawke said.

“Oh no, I do have an ulterior motive. We need money. Fifty sovereigns to be precise”, Varric said.

“Oh”. Hawke looked a bit crestfallen. “Your spies have seen where we live, yes?”

“I have no doubts that the famous Hawke will find a way to come up with the money. Besides, if you become an equal partner, Bartrand will have no choice but to let you join the expedition. Besides, I’m sure having a mage with us will come in handy. Who knows what kind of weird shit we’ll find down there”. Varric had suspected Hawke of being an apostate ever since he first met, but the way her face went carefully blank confirmed it. 

“A mage? Who’s a mage?” Hawke said innocently. 

“Certainly not either of us” her brother supplied. Hawke had turned the full force of her smile on Varric in a way that had to be intentional. It made him feel slightly dazed for a moment, but Varric liked to think he recovered very quickly. 

“Don’t worry. You do a very good job of hiding it. I’m just a very, very observant person. I’m a writer you see, it comes with the territory” Varric said. 

Because she really was very good at hiding it. Most Circle runaways were almost painfully obvious by how they all acted like socially inept academics who’d never done a hard day’s work in their life. Which, now that he thought about it, was probably just what the templars wanted. No, Varric would bet money that Hawke was a life-long apostate, and that took a certain kind of cunning that you only learnt by spending a large part of your formative years in back alleys and seedy taverns. 

“Don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone. I don’t exactly see eye to eye with the templars myself” Varric reassured the increasingly paranoid looking siblings. 

“I thought I was doing so well,” Hawke said, disappointed.

“Oh, sure. Just admit it why don’t you” Carver sighed. “We only just got here.”

“I don’t think anyone else suspects. I only realised after I had I seen you fight in person. With that staff of yours”. Varric nodded to the quarterstaff currently resting on Hawke’s back.

“Well, I’m sure mother won’t mind packing up and moving in the dead of night. Again. I hear Wycome is nice this time of year” Carver continued.

“This? This is just an ordinary quarterstaff I inherited from my father. Half of Lowtown probably owns similar ones. It had to have been something more” Hawke told Varric, both of them ignoring Carver. 

And she had a point. The quarterstaff was a common weapon amongst Kirkwall’s disreputable residents as it was both cheaper and required less skill than most metal weapons such as swords, shields, and axes. The one Hawke used was sleek, dark and had a sharp blade on the end. It was so very unlike the ornate staffs of the Circle mages that no one would ever look twice at it. 

His spies reported that Hawke had an uncanny ability to talk her way out of conflicts, and that she was a formidable fighter when talking wasn’t enough. 

“She fights with a staff and a bow most of the time, although I’ve seen her use knives a few times in close quarters”, Myrwen, one of Varric’s spies, had told him a month ago, as they were both lurking in an alleyway, watching Hawke and her brother brawl with a number of competitive smuggler’s trying to intercept their cargo. 

Hawke moved so fast she was almost blurring at the edges, cracking her staff over the head of one attacker, and then using the rebound to sweep the ankle of another one. 

“I’ve never seen someone take down so many people with just a stick” Myrwen observed. “Are you sure she was a farmer?”

“That’s the story they’re going with. And none of my sources have been able to refute it”, Varric answered. It was very easy to miss if you weren’t looking for it, but Varric was looking, and that’s why he saw the small flash of lightning whenever her staff connected and how her arrows always found their mark, even when they would have to curve in impossible ways to do so. That was a mage, alright. A very skilled one by the looks of it. 

One of the Coterie Assassins ducked under the swing of Hawke’s staff and caught her with a sharp elbow in the face. A spatter of blood stained the cobblestones, as Hawke stumbled back, and Carver dove in front of her to take out the assassin with an angry swing of his sword. 

Glass shattered against the stones, and the sudden flash of a grenade momentarily blinded Varric. A wave of force swept through the alley, making the hairs on the back of Varric’s neck stand up, and he instinctively reached for Bianca.

By the time Varric could see properly again, the rest of the Coterie’s men were dead, or unconscious on the ground, and Hawke was casually wiping blood off her chin. Varric dragged Myrwen with him further into the shadows to let Hawke and Carver pass them by undisturbed. 

“Did...did you see that?” Myrwen hissed. She had gone pale, and there was a tremor to her voice. She kept looking back the way Hawke had disappeared, as if watching for a stalking predator.

“Yeah, it was very impressive alright. Girl’s definitely a mage” Varric said, but he also knew simple sorcery was not enough to unnerve Myrwen like this. He’d seen her take an arrow to the shoulder without so much as a flinch, for God’s sake. 

“No, not that. I thought- ” Myrwen started. “For just a second, there was something else where Hawke was standing. It...it looked like nothing I’ve ever seen before.’’

If Varric had been a more sensible man, this would have made him abandon his plans and stay far away from the Hawkes form then on. But where others saw danger and volatility, Varric saw the potential of something _great_. Hawke was the kind of person for whom epics were named, the kind of person who grew and grew until they became too big for their own skin, and left a trail of stories in their wake. 

All Varric had to do was pick up the pieces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone thinks Hawke reminds them of Carrot Ironfoundersson (of Discworld fame) - that is quite intentional, although the likeness may fade a bit as the story goes on.


	4. They Call Us Monsters

The first time Anders met Hawke, he tried to kill her. 

He had felt it before the door to the clinic swung open, a prickling of energy in the air the likes of which he hasn’t felt since the Broodmother in the Deep Roads. It felt like blood and dread. It felt _ancient._

He didn’t look up from his work, though. Better to let this creature think it caught him unaware. Justice stirred inside of him, getting ready to fight.

The footsteps grew closer. There were at least three of them. Dammit, he’d done so well up until now. 

Anders spun around, hands already glowing and ready to fight whatever abomination that had just managed to break through his wards. ”This is a place of healing and salvation. How dare you threaten it!” he roared, magic seeping out of his very being. 

But the magic dissipates in the air before it ever reaches its target, and it is enough to make Anders pause, just for a moment, and take in the people standing in front of him. 

Instead of snarling monsters, he found two young, scruffy-looking humans and a dwarf with a disconcerting amount of chest hair staring back at him. 

“Um, I didn’t mean to threaten anything. Sorry?’’ one of the humans, a young woman, said. 

_Templars?_ Anders thought hysterically, even though he already knew the answer. For one, the humans were wearing patched leather armour rather than the ostentatious breastplate the templars liked clanking around in. Sure, they could be here incognito, but that would imply a level of competency previously unheard of at the Kirkwall Circle. It was, after all, one of the reasons he chose to come here. Anders is also intimately familiar with the templar’s _Silence_ , their way of draining all the mana out of a mage in seconds, but this wasn’t that. He could still feel his magic crackling just behind his fingertips, but when he tried to form it, to pull it out of the air and form it into fire, it just...disappeared. Like water into sand. 

He tries again, but the woman moves faster than Anders can register, and suddenly she had grasped his hand between both of hers. 

“No, no. No more of that now. We just want to talk” she said in a low, calm voice, like she was trying to soothe a startled animal. The magic died between his fingers. She was a mage, just like him. And her hands were very warm.

“What kind of abomination are you?” Anders whispered.

“I’m Hawke. It’s very nice to meet you”, the woman replies casually, apparently completely unruffled by the fact that he just tried to attack her. _Twice._

“We’re also not abominations. I feel like that’s important to put out there” the other human added, looking over Hawke’s shoulder at Anders. 

“Yes, I like to think I would have noticed if a demon set up shop in my body”, the dwarf supplied. 

Hawke let go of Anders' hand, and took a step back. _Come back, touch me again_. Anders wants to plead. He doesn’t.

“Grey Wardens then? Come to drag me back to the order?” He asked instead. 

‘’Oh no, nothing so serious. This is my brother Carver, and our friend Varric. You’re Anders, right? The Grey Warden mage?”

Anders nodded. “You’re Fereldan too? Have we met before?”. Now that he’d had time to actually look, Hawke and her brother seemed so familiar. Like childhood friends you hadn’t met in years, but would still recognize anywhere. But they couldn’t possibly be. 

“Ah, I don’t think so. My family weren’t really Circle folk,” Hawke replied casually, like she hadn’t just admitted to being a life-long fugitive . “But it’s always nice to meet a fellow countryman”.

“Oh, we’re just telling everyone now?” Carver interjected. “Want to go have a nice chat with that very obvious templar we passed a while back later?”

“I would never sell out a fellow mage!” Anders said. “I would never subject anyone to the suffering I’ve had to endure”

“Do you think I’m new to this?” Carver replied.”People like to act all noble until the templars start threatening you or your family, and then it’s everyone for themselves.”

“Look, we just need your map of the deep roads so we can do some light grave robbing” Hawke said, clearly trying to change to subject to avoid a fight. 

“Requisitional Archeology, Hawke. We agreed to call it requisitional archeology” Varric interjected. 

“You’re going to the Deep Roads?” 

“Well, not without a map we’re not” Varric said. 

“We could pay-” Hawke tries before Carver elbows her in the side. “I mean, we can’t actually pay you in, um, money. On account of us not having any.”

Anders was a naturally suspicious person. Paranoid, even. But when Hawke turned her bright eyes and kind smile towards him, he couldn’t help but smile back. 

“Oh, I think there is a way we can help each other,” Anders found himself saying, thinking of Karl. Thinking that he could really use some allies in this godforsaken town. “How do you feel about helping a mage escape the Circle of Magi?” 

“What? No!” Carver exclaimed at the exact same time Hawke said “Sure!”. The siblings glared at each other, and proceeded to have what seemed like an entire argument in 30 seconds worth of pointed looks and aggressive hand gestures. Finally, Carver threw his hands up and said: “Fine! But you are not using magic”.

“Knives it is” Hawke agreed cheerfully.

“And if we get caught we are just a couple of honest mercenaries that you-” He pointed at Anders “tricked into doing this. Possibly with blood magic and/or other unsavory means”.

“But we won’t get caught, so it’s a moot point,” Hawke said. “The Chantry at midnight then?”

“The Chantry at midnight,” Anders echoed, feeling like this conversation had totally gotten away from him.

___________________________________________________________________

Anders had arrived at the Chantry courtyard five minutes to midnight. It had been an unusually calm night; he’d only had to fend off two robbery attempts on the way there. He spotted three familiar shapes lurking behind a pillar and let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding. 

“You’re here” he hissed at his new companions, trying not to sound pathetically relieved. 

“Of course we are. We agreed we would be,” Hawke gave Anders a confused look, like she couldn’t fathom the idea of not upholding an agreement. In hindsight, that was probably what had drawn Anders in. Anders had spent most of his life alone, trusting nothing and no one. That was just how people in the Circle operated, everyone was out for themselves, and would sell you out at a moment’s notice if it meant saving themselves. Anders couldn’t really fault any of them for that, he’d done it himself after all. Meeting someone so blindingly earnest felt, at the same time, strangely exotic and utterly endearing. 

“Varric was nice enough to come along and help too,” Hawke continued. 

“Shit, Hawke of course I did. Offering to heroically rescue an ally’s lover despite great risk to yourself - this chapter will practically write itself.”

“Wait, I never said he was my lover” Anders muttered. 

“And this expedition will be dead in the gutter before it even starts if we don’t get that map, so I kind of had to come along regardless of literary merit - but it’s a nice bonus”. 

“How in the world did you know he used to be my lover?” 

The dwarf patted his arm encouragingly. “It’s very obvious, Blondie.” 

“It really was” Hawke agreed. Anders did not feel that it was very obvious at all, and he was starting to reconsider his initial assessment of Varric being the normal one in the group.

“Are you seriously going to include this in your book? You realise we’re about to commit like six different crimes, right?” Carver hissed. Yep, it was Carver. Carver was definitely the normal one. 

The Chantry was just as dark, empty and quiet as the night outside. The incense from that night’s mass still hung in the air, and made Anders’ eyes water as he crept up the stairs. Considering how loud and straight-forward his new companions normally were, they were surprisingly good at being sneaky. Hawke followed just behind Anders, footsteps so silent she may as well just have been a shadow, and even Carver somehow managed to muffle the sound of his armour to the point where it almost faded in the background. 

Anders allowed himself to feel a flicker of hope. Maybe he could really do this. Maybe this time it wouldn’t end in tears and bloodshed. Maybe, maybe, _maybe._

“Anders” Karl’s familiar voice suddenly echoed through the large hall. “I knew you’d never give up”. 

Karl wasn't in the place they had agreed upon, which normally would have been cause for concern, but Anders was too happy and relieved that he was there at all to care.  
Behind him, Hawke gasped and stumbled over her own feet. “Something’s wrong. Something’s wrong with him” she hissed. “He’s so quiet. He’s so _quiet_ , Anders. You hear it too, Carver, right?”

Carver murmured something, but Anders didn’t listen. Karl’s face was clouded in shadows. 

Anders walked closer. “What wrong? Why are you talking like-” Karl turned, and Anders saw his face (his beautiful, beautiful face) for the first time in over ten years, and he also saw his empty, dead eyes, and Anders knew exactly what that meant. 

“I was too troublesome, too opinionated for a mage” the shell that used to be Karl said. “It had to be done, old friend. How else will mages ever master themselves? You’ll understand soon enough”.

Anders felt as if the entire world had suddenly shifted to zero in on this very moment. Behind them, the heavy footsteps and clang of plate armour could be heard as the templars slowly marched closer, surrounding them. Carver swore loudly, and shoved Anders behind him, sword already in hand. Hawke slipped into place at Carver’s left side, knives in hand, with Varric flipping the safety of his crossbow right next to her.

“Leave the mage, and we’ll let you live,” their leader said. Silence fell like the swing of an axe.

Carver gave Hawke a short, resigned nod, and then Hawke let herself go. Just a little, just enough for the templar’s to see how the magic was seeped into her very bones. To see her shadow unfurling towards the ceiling, ten times bigger and with far more limbs than a normal human. 

“I feel like that should make our position known,” Carver said. 

“Demons! Kill them all!” the templar captain shouted. 

Justice filled Anders’ eyes with blue light. WIth rage and vengeance. He blacked out. 

When Anders came to, he had blood on his face, clothes and hair. And the only thing left of the templars were their crumpled, broken bodies on the stone floor. But Karl is still there. Still alive.

Karl asked Anders to kill him, and so Anders did. He kills the best friend he’s ever had, and he hates how easy it is. Easier than I could have ever imagined, he thought as he stared at Karl’s limp corpse. He doesn’t know how long he stood there, but eventually, Hawke sidled up to him. “Hey, Anders,” she said. “Still in there?” 

“Yes” 

“That’s good. Very good. Would you mind giving me your hand for a minute?”. Anders doesn’t know what good that’ll do, but he offered her his hand anyway.

Hawke fixed Anders with an intense look, like she was trying to look through him straight into his soul. With only a thin sliver of moonlight illuminating her face, Hawkes’ eyes looked like molten gold.

After a moment, Hawke’s face lit up with relief. “Yeah, that’s our Anders alright”, she said. Anders feels like he wants to cry. 

The others decided that Varric would stay behind to clean up the crime scene a bit, maybe stage a possession, or literally anything else that didn’t make it obvious that apostates had been behind this.  
Hawke and Carver practically dragged Anders back to the clinic, and then Anders told them everything, could hardly stop the words spilling from his lips. Carver had scoured the clinic for threadbare blankets, and wrapped them all around Anders, whilst Hawke had washed the blood from his hair. They didn’t say anything, but they listened. They stayed. He told them about the Circle, the Wardens, about how he let himself be possessed by a spirit of justice, how he let himself become an abomination. 

“Do you think me a monster?” Anders asked, when it was finally all laid out in front of them. He hated how small his voice sounded. Hawke and Carver exchanged an indecipherable look. Anders wondered if all siblings had the ability to have entire conversations through glances and cryptic gestures, or if it was yet another thing that made the Hawkes special.

“I’ll go and try to wash the blood out of your coat,” Carver finally said, and stalked out of the room. 

“Well, I guess that was an answer of sorts,” Anders said. 

Hawke gave him a small, secret smile. “Us monsters need to look out for each other” she said. Then and there, Anders thought that he would follow her to the ends of the world if she ever asked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally supposed to feature Hawke meeting Isabela and Merrill as well, but the chapter kinda got away from me and got way too long, so I decided to split it up into two parts. So that's what's in store for next chapter.


	5. First Times

The first time Isabela met Hawke, Isabela pegged her for an easy mark. Varric had been raving about this new “Hawke” kid for weeks at that point, and Isabela was seriously considering stabbing him. 

‘’I’m telling you, Rivaini, you’ve never met anyone like Hawke before. People listen to her."

“People listen to me too, you know,” Isabela said. She was still smarting after the loss of her ship, and really not in the mood for this. 

“Sure they do, but most of the time they listen because you have a knife to their throat, or your tits in their face. Both of which may be considered strong incentives.”

“And Hawke doesn’t give people incentives?”

“No, not at all really. She just sort of...appeals to their inner conscience"

“Conscience? In Kirkwall?” Isabela said with mock outrage. Most residents of Kirkwall didn’t even know what a conscience was, and if they did, would immediately try to sell it to the highest bidder. 

“I know! I thought it was strange too, but it just...works somehow. She just smiles, and then everything she says sounds incredibly reasonable”. Varric had that slightly manic glint in his eyes he always got when he’d just started on a new story. Isabela could see the plot points clicking together in his mind. 

“...And she’s a mage, right?”

Varric grinned. “It’s not blood magic, Rivaini. Not unless she’s figured out a way to do it without any actual blood.”

Isabela rolled her eyes and took a large swig of her drink. Idealistic hero types wandered into the Hanged Man every few months or so, bright eyed and bursting with moral conviction, determined to clean up the general riff-raff of Lowtown with the Chant and general moral fiber. And due to the fact that at least half of the Hanged Man’s clientele were lifelong members of some sort of organised crime syndicate, and the other half was _worse_ \- their efforts generally failed spectacularly. Isabela highly doubted this Hawke would be any different. 

______

The first time Hawke showed up at the Hanged Man, Isabela was holding a knife to a man’s throat, which wasn’t unusual really, and neither was the captive audience that came with it. The Hanged Man's main attraction was the large number of highly entertaining bar brawls that one could expect to break out at least once a night. 

“The clientele in this bar has some very interesting ideas about what constitutes drinking manners,” Varric dryly remarked as the men who’d been harassing Isabela slunk off, tails firmly between their legs. The woman next to Varric gave Isabela a look of open, earnest admiration. Ah, this must be Hawke. 

“Perhaps you should introduce me to your new friend, Varric?” Isabela suggested, but Hawke was already rushing forward to shake Isabela’s hand: “It is so great to meet you finally! Could you show me that thing you did with the knife?” 

The stories told about Hawke by Varric, and a collection of other bar patrons and fellow criminals, had generally limited descriptions of her physical appearance down to vague terms like “bright” or “lovely”but Isabela had always assumed this to be code for “very pretty” because that would honestly explain a lot, as she had first-hand experience of what a deadly combination a pretty face and a silver tongue could be. And Isabela had been, at least partly, right, Hawke was quite pretty. She had large amber eyes, and the sort of fine bone structure that would make men project their favourite ‘damsel in distress’-fantasy all over her despite all evidence to the contrary. 

“Hello, sweet thing,” Isabela purred. “I take it you’re the famous Hawke everyone is talking about”. Hawke, bless her soul, actually blushed. Isabela gave her about two months before she either left or became corrupt, which was honestly quite generous. 

“Y’know, you might be just what I am looking for to solve a little problem of mine,” Isabela continued.

“Can’t anyone fix their own problems around here?” Hawke’s brother seemed less impressed by Isabela’s charm, but his eyes also kept flickering down to Isabela’s cleavage, so she figured he would be amenable. 

“Must be something in the water,” Isabela happily agreed. “Someone from my past has been pestering me, and I’ve arranged for us to duel. If I win - he’ll leave me alone. But I don’t trust him to play fair, so I need someone to watch my back.” 

“Who is this person? Perhaps I could talk to him?” Hawke, bless her heart, said. 

“His name is Hayder. We worked together back in Antiva, and I think we might be past the point of words unfortunately. He’s never liked me, you see,” Isabela said.

“And I’m sure you did nothing to warrant that dislike” Varric said dryly. 

“Of course not, Varric. It’s like you don’t know me at all,” Isabela replied with a laugh.

“Why a duel, though?” Hawke asked.

“I like duels. I’m rather good at them, and if I win, he’ll be dead. Problem solved!” 

“But you don’t think he’ll honour the duel?” Hawke asked.

“Oh, no. I fully expect an ambush, and so should you. We’re career criminals after all, if you aren’t planning on stabbing your enemies in the back you’re not doing it right,” Isabela said. 

“Hey, speak for yourself,” Varric said. “My business is completely legitimate". At least four people within earshot audibly snorted at this. “Well, no one’s ever been able to prove that it’s not,” he amended. 

“I also don’t really consider myself a ‘career criminal’’ Hawke said thoughtfully. “I think of myself as more of a freelancer.”

“As in you’ll freely do anything for the right amount of money” Isabela asked. Hawke and her brother both had the tell-tale sunken cheeks and slight hollowness around the eyes that one would only get from going long periods without proper food. Isabela was intimately familiar with that particular level of desperation herself. 

“Almost anything”, Hawke answered. 

“Would helping out a new friend be included in the anything-category?” Isabela asked and was, for the first time, given a taste of Hawke’s famous smile. And Isabela recognized that smile. It was exactly the same as the one her mother (may she rot in hell) had used to convince her marks that yes, she had spoken to their dead relatives and they really needed to tell her where they kept all their coin. _Huh,_ Isabela thought. _I may have underestimated this one._

\----------------------------------------

Hayder had agreed to meet Isabela that very evening. And because Hayder had always had an annoyingly pretentious flair for the dramatic: he’d picked the Chantry as their meeting spot. 

“Why do we always end up in the Chantry? Is the universe trying to tell us something? Is this an incredibly roundabout attempt to convert us?” Carver muttered as they entered the dark, empty building. 

“We also always seem to end up getting attacked and forced to kill a whole bunch of people in this Chantry, so whatever message the Maker is trying to send is extremely muddled,” Varric responded.

As it turned out, Hayder was not alone in the Chantry: Because of course he wasn’t. A large number of heavily armed men and women were lounging around the pulpit and ostentatious statues, trying to look nonchalant despite the large amount of weapons they all had upon their person. 

“Of course it’s a fucking ambush”, Carver said. “It’s always an ambush. Why do we even try anymore?”

“Is it really an ambush if we already knew we were going to be ambushed?”, Hawke quipped.

“Isabela!’’ A man in a ponytail and an accent so strong you could hear the fake passport in his voice emerged dramatically from the shadows. Hayder. “Castillion was heartbroken when he heard of your shipwreck! You should let him know you survived.”

“It must’ve slipped my mind,” Isabela replied. “One does get so busy these days.”

‘’If any of you work for the Templars, I would like to inform you that I am not a mage, and also definitely not the mage that killed a bunch of people in here awhile ago”. Hawke walked up next to Isabela, and the dim light must have illuminated her face properly for the first time since their arrival, because now a wave of unease fell over Hayder’s henchmen. Isabela heard frantic whispers of _“Hawke”_ and _“....didn’t sign up for this”._ There was a general scuffle as several of the hired thugs tried to hide themselves from Hawke’s gaze. 

Hawke seemed to have realised this too, as she was craning her neck and rising up to her tiptoes to wave excitedly to the hired muscle, several of whom were starting to look like they would rather be anywhere else. 

Hayder sent Isabela a ‘what the fuck is she doing?’-type of look. Isabela shrugged. She wasn’t sure either, but she was very interested in how this would play out. 

“Oh, hello! Hague isn’t it? And is that Flint with you?” Hawke called in a cheery tone. ‘’It surprises me to see you here. Do you not know that duelling is illegal in Kirkwall? And attempted murder even more so. I’d hate to see you in a jail cell. Didn’t you just get married Flint? Think of poor Sebastien! And isn’t your wife pregnant again, Hague?’’ The men who’d just been addressed by name frantically searched Hawke’s face for the implied threat that they knew must be there, somewhere, but they found nothing but genuine concern. This was somehow even more terrifying. 

Finally one of them found his words again: “Ahem, yes. There seems to have, ah, been some sort of mistake. I’ll just be going then.” When the two men sheepishly extricated themselves from Hayder’s side, a good third of the others followed, muttering apologies as they passed Hawke, who was still magnanimously beaming at them. Hayder stared blankly after them, like he couldn’t quite process what had just happened.

“It’s so hard to hire good help nowadays, isn’t it?" Varric said in a smug tone. 

Hayder recovered quickly. “Where’s the relic?” he snarled. 

“I lost it. Castillion is just going to have to do without”, Isabela said.

“Am I the only one who thinks it’s becoming very obvious that there is way more to this story than Isabela has said?”

“Are you saying you didn’t get that from the start?” Hawke asked.

“But then why would you...Oh, forget it!” Carver said, and cast a wistful look towards the door. He wished he could just walk out, but mother would give him hell for leaving without Marian.

“Just like you lost a ship full of valuable cargo?” Hayder said.

“Stop calling it cargo. They were people for fuck’s sake," Isabela said. 

“Those slaves were worth at least a hundred sovereigns a head, and you let them scurry off into the forest!”

“You know, I’ve been kinda on the fence about this whole venture up until now, but that tipped me over,” Carver said. “Let’s kill this guy.”

“I’m so glad you said so”. Isabela smiled, and then there was a horrible _thud_ , and one of her knives was sticking out of Hayder’s chest. He fell to the ground with blood bubbling out of his chest as the more loyal of his henchmen descended on them. 

The actual fight was fairly short, as far as fights go. Most of the fighting spirit had left their opponents the moment Hayder died, and the vast majority chose to flee the second they realised the battle wasn’t going their way. Hawke still managed to surprise Isabela by proving to be a competent fighter without even once casting a visible spell, and instead holding her own with a quarterstaff and a long dagger. It was only if you looked closely that you could see the faint shimmer of a magical barrier, or the fact that Carver couldn’t possibly move that fast without at least three haste-spells stacked on top of eachother. It was all very clever, and not at all what one would expect from someone like Hawke. 

Back at the Hanged Man, Isabela was forced to admit to herself that she might have been wrong about Hawke. A lot of people thought that Hawke was simple when they first met her. And in a lot of ways that was true. She was forthright, kind, and honest to a fault. Isabela saw the real thing, of course. But she was also the sort of person who admired a good lie. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When Hawke and Carver had first tried to talk Varric into hiking up the Wounded Coast to meet the Dalish clan camped out there, he had been quite sceptical. For one, he was a city dwarf at heart and felt deeply that nature was something that happened to other people. Secondly, whilst some Dalish clans were quite friendly towards outsiders, rumour had it this was not one of them. Varric had finally agreed on the basis that he had seen Hawke charm even the most hardened criminals, and if she was unsuccessful this time, well, she’d need someone to watch her back.It wouldn’t do to let his new muse die before her story even really got of the ground, after all.

Aveline had wanted to come, but they had quickly realised that bringing a captain of the City Guard might make it seem too much like a shakedown, and Isabela was too new of a friend to openly solicit for favours like this so the last opening in their party had been given to Anders, who was under strict orders to “be cool” about the whole possession thing. 

They hadn’t gotten within a mile of the camp when two elven scouts emerged from the trees, armed to the teeth with weapons they clearly knew how to use. 

“Can I help you?” one of the scouts asked. Varric had been told to fuck off with more warmth and humour. This did not discourage Hawke whatsoever. 

“It’s nice to meet you, I’m Hawke. So, it’s kind of a long story but when my family was running from the darkspawn in Ferelden, because of the Blight you know, we were saved by a dragon. Except it wasn’t a dragon, it was an old woman, and she made me promise to bring a necklace to you”, Hawke said in the same tone one would use to recount their lovely trip to the countryside.  
“Maker, I know I shouldn’t have let you tell it,” Carver muttered. 

“Well, it’s nice to realise I’m not the only one who had some really weird experiences during the Blight”, Anders mused. 

“Oh, you reckon you could’ve done a better job?” Hawke rounded on her brother. 

“Yes, yes I do”, Carver said in a haughty tone.

“Without lying?”

“Yes!”

“Without omitting large parts of events?”

“Well…”

“Ha!” Hawke said triumphantly. 

The scouts regarded the bickering siblings with growing scepticism, and Varric couldn’t really blame them for that. Whilst Hawke, on her own, was able to almost instantly charm most people - the siblings together were sort of an acquired taste. Some days, it seemed like the pair of them were sharing the same mind, communicating largely through quick looks and vague gestures. Other days, they would bicker constantly, neither of them seemingly capable of uttering a word without the other one going for the throat. The bickering days had been getting more and more frequent lately, although Varric was not sure why. 

Varric gave the scouts his most placid smile. The one that he used when trade guild meetings became a bit too rowdy, and people started reaching for the axes they’d all inevitably hidden under their tables even though they’d collectively agreed not to bring weapons, as their mediations had an annoying tendency to end with someone missing a limb. The scouts didn’t smile back, but they had also not tried to shoot them yet, so Varric counted that as a win. 

“So anyway, this is the amulet”. As Hawke lifted her hand up to let the sun illuminate the amulet, the expressions on the elves’ faces went from barely restrained hostility to something that looked a lot like reverence in about two seconds flat.  
“We will take you to Keeper Marethari”, one of the scouts said. “Keep your weapons out of your hands within our territory, and no one will harm you”. 

The Keeper, an unusually tall woman with white hair, was waiting for them near the entrance, like she had known they were coming. “Ah, Elgar’len. It has been quite some time since our clan had contact with your kind,” she told Hawke in a tone that suggested it had not nearly been long enough. “I was saddened by the news of your father’s passing.”

“You knew our father?” Hawke asked. 

“Yes, indeed. Your father was a friend to our clan at times, and thus we shall try to be a friend to you”, Marethari said with a small, sad smile. “You both burn with much the same light as he did.”

“We often traded with the Dalish clans that passed through Lothering but I don’t remember yours being one of them”

“Oh, no. This was a long time ago, before either of you were born”, The Keeper said in a tone that made it clear she would not elaborate further. “My scouts tell me you have been given a quest by Asha’bellanar, the one shemlen calls Flemeth.”

“Please don’t make her tell the story again”, Carver said, and promptly received a sharp elbow to the ribs from his sister.

Keeper Marethari valiantly ignored them: “The amulet must be taken to the top of the mountain to be placed on the stone altar and given a Dalish rite for departed spirits. Do this and your debt will be paid.”

“Well, that doesn’t seem too difficult,” Hawke said. “Could you teach me this rite, or are you coming with?”

“I will send my first with you. She will see to it that the rite is done properly. You will find her just up that path”. The Keeper gestured towards a narrow trail that, at times, looked to be more vertical than horizontal. 

“Ugh, this is why I didn’t want to come”, Varric grumbled.  
___________________________________________________________________  
“Wasn’t your father from the Ferelden Circle? How could he have traveled with the Dalish?” Anders asks as they make their way up the mountain. He was a little embarrassed by how fascinated he was with Malcolm Hawke, but he had good reason to be. The man had, after all, managed to achieve a myriad of things that were out of reach for most mages. Not only had he successfully escaped the Circle and lived out the rest of his life in relative peace, he had also managed to create a family, and raise his own children. Not that Anders was particularly keen on children himself, but it would’ve been nice to have the option, he felt. 

“Hmm? Oh, yeah he didn’t grow up in the Circle. He spent most of his youth traveling”, Carver said as he narrowly avoided slipping in the mud and falling off the side of the steep ledge they were edging past.

“He wasn’t even technically Fereldan. He just sort of decided to adopt the nationality because he liked the atmosphere”, Hawke added. “Dad was born in Tevinter, but I don’t think he’d been back in a really long time.”

“Hold up,” Varric said. “Your father was a citizen of the Tevinter empire?”

‘’Oh, I’m not sure he’s actually a citizen. He left Tevinter a long time ago, you see. I don’t think he liked it very much. He taught us some Tevene when we were kids though, but my accent is a bit terrible”, Hawke said.

“Terrible’ is a gross understatement”, Carver sniped, but before Hawke could respond they rounded a large cliff, and came upon a young, dark-haired elf girl. 

“Oh! I didn’t hear.” The elf said. “You must be the one the Keeper told me about. Aneth ara. I’m Merrill, but you probably knew that already. Sorry, I didn’t ask your name unless it’s terribly rude to ask a human their name?” she rambled.  
“Not at all. It’s really nice to meet you too”, Hawke said. 

The first time Merrill laid eyes on Hawke her first thought was: _Oh, she’s not human_. Which wasn’t a problem, really. Most of Merrills best friends weren’t human either, or even necessarily corporeal. No, the problem was that Hawke was still pretending that she was.

Hawke reached out and clasped Merrill’s hand in greeting, and there it was - that sharp, unmistakable tang of the Fade rolling of Hawke like cheap perfume. Definitely not entirely human. But Merrill was not sure that her other companions knew that. Her brother had to know, he even had a whiff of it himself, but perhaps they were hiding it for a reason? She knew that most humans feared magic and the spirits of the fade. They would understand about Hawke, might react with anger and violence like humans were wont to do to things they didn’t understand. Probably best to keep it to herself for now then. Hawke seemed really nice, and Merrill didn’t want to get her new friend into trouble. 

“So do you want to help us do a funeral rite for a wierd witch we met in Ferelden?” Hawke asked.  
___________________________________________________________________  
Hahren na melana sahlin,” Merrill chanted.She could feel the others staring at her, and hoped she wasn’t making a fool out of herself.”Emma ir abelas, souver'inan isala hamin”. Slowly, the amulet on the old stone altar began to glow with a golden light. 

“Is it supposed to do that?” a voice behind her said, but was quickly silenced by the three others’ loud shushing. 

The light grew and grew until it sprung into a veil of bright, dancing flames, and from it a woman emerged. The woman stepped down from the altar like a queen coming to address her subjects. Merrill sunk into a hasty bow.

“Do rise, my child,” Flemeth said.”The People are far too quick to bend their knees. Unlike some,” she said with a pointed glance towards the three humans and the dwarf, who had been watching the proceedings with varying levels of horror, confusion and interest. Varric looked like he desperately wished he could take notes. 

“It’s so refreshing to see someone who keeps their end of a bargain. I half-expected my amulet to end up in some merchant’s pocket.”

“Well, I have to say I’m a bit surprised. Most funerals do not include the deceased rising from the dead. Or at least not any of the funerals I’ve been to. Perhaps things are different in the North?” Hawke answered. “Although it is nice to see you again, Flemeth.”

“It’s nice to see you too, Elgar’dalen,” Flemeth said with a smile.”That’s what the People call you yes? It is fitting I suppose. Although perhaps not entirely accurate.” Merrill couldn’t help but notice that Hawke and Flemeth had almost exactly the same eye colour.

“What are you?” Anders exclaimed. “A spirit? An abomination? This is like no magic I’ve ever seen.” 

Flemeth chuckled. “There is quite a lot of magic in this world that you have never heard of, Anders of the Grey Wardens. Does that mean that it does not exist? But to answer your question: I am an old, old woman who has seen and learnt more about this word and the one beyond than most can even imagine. And that is all you need to know”. 

“If that’s the case - Why did you need me to bring you here?” Hawke asked. “You could’ve just turned into a dragon again and flown, couldn’t you?”

“I have a very important appointment to keep, and I didn’t want to be followed. You smuggled me here quite nicely.”

“I don’t understand. Are you some sort of vision?”

“You of all people should know that bodies are such limiting things, and so easy to transcend once you learn to let yourself go. I am but a fragment cast adrift from the whole, a piece of driftwood to cling to in a storm.”

“Where is the whole then? Do you need help to find your way to it?” Hawke asked. Flemeth laughed again, but this time it sounded almost fond. “You have saved my life, just like I saved yours, child. It is an even trade, and now we must go our separate ways.”

“But you know, don’t you? You know what’s coming," Hawke said. 

“Better than most, yes. Destiny awaits us both, dear girl, but not even I can say how it will all play out in the end. I know you desire more, but the only things I can offer is a piece of advice and a warning”, Flemeth said. “We stand upon the precipice of change. The world fears the inevitable plummet into the abyss. Watch for that moment...and when it comes, do not hesitate to leap. It is only when you fall that you will learn if you can fly.”

“Cheap advice from a dragon”, Hawke said, which earned her another approving smile from Flemeth. “We all have our challenges, dear”, she said.

“And the warning?”

“The gods do not play nice, child. Not even with their kin. They will eat everything you are if you let them” Flemeth said to Hawke, before she turned her yellow eyes on Merrill. “As for you child, step carefully. No path is darker than when your eyes are shut.”

“Ma serannas, Asha’bellanar”, Merrill replied reverently. 

“And now it is time for me to take my leave. You have my thanks, Hawke, and my sympathy”: The old woman was yet again enveloped in bright, blinding flames, and when the light finally dimmed a massive dragon unfolded it’s wings and leapt into the air with a grace that should not be possible for a creature of that size.

“God, I wish I could do that”, Hawke said.


	6. A Wolf Comes to Kirkwall

Fenris have had, what could only charitably be called, a year. His life had become a blur of wagons, roads, cities and barely evading capture. Of sleeping in barns, under trees, in taverns and alleys. Of running and running and running. 

The fatigue had set deep into his bones by the time he arrived in the Free Marches. He can’t remember not being tired, and he hopes that the big city will give him even a moment’s reprieve. In the small farms and villages he’s passed through on the way here, being an elf with white hair, a greatsword and fucking gleaming tattoos made him stick out like a sore thumb.The slavehunters barely even had to try. In the big, bustling city that is Kirkwall he hopes to disappear in the crowd and the endless alleys. To be just another face in passing by. And it actually works for a while, for enough time that Fenris’ fatigue transformed into a cold rage. 

He's done running. _Done_. So when the slave hunters start sniffing around again Fenris pays a dwarf the little money he has to hire a band of mercenaries and sets his trap. Let the hunted become the hunter for once.

_____

The Kirkwall alienage managed to feel both cramped and endless at the same time, consisting mostly of an uncountable maze of tunnels and alleys where anyone and anything could get lost in a matter of minutes if you didn’t know the right path. Come to think of it, that was probably the idea. Most non-elves avoided the place, and the City Guard never came here unless they absolutely had to, and then only in the company of a full squad. The only open space was the courtyard at the centre of it all, where the large Vhendahl watched over some of Kirkwall’s least regarded citizens. They were there to retrieve some stolen cargo for a dwarf named Anso, who was very obviously leaving out details from the job description, but Hawke had still insisted on accepting it. Carver was still fuming at the sheer stupidity of it all.

“It’s ten gold sovereigns, Carver!” Hawke said. “We are so close to being able to fund the expedition now. We don’t have to trust him. We’ll give him his stuff and he’ll give us the money and then we’ll never have to speak to him ever again.”

“And if we piss off the Carta or the Coterie in the process hmm? If they put a price on our heads? What happens then?” 

“If the Carta or the Coterie truly wanted to put a price on our heads they would have done it by now.” 

“Just don’t come crying to me if this screws up your precious expedition”.

“I promise you that all crying will be done in private”, Hawke said easily, trying to lighten the mood. 

“As if you are capable of doing anything without making it into a spectacle” Carver sneered. 

Hawke gritted her teeth and resisted the impulse to say something equally cutting in response. They seemed to be fighting more and more these days, always snapping at each other over the smallest of things. Hawke didn’t like fighting with Carver, hated it in fact, but she also wasn’t quite sure how to . Bethany had always been the peacekeeper of the family, always able to mediate between her headstrong brother and sister. But now Bethany was gone, and the fights didn’t stop but rather just seemed to loop back into themselves with no real resolution. 

Hawke sighed. “Look, you don’t have to come if you don’t want to. I’ve got Varric and Isabela with me, so I won’t be alone”.

Carver gave her an annoyed look. “Don’t be stupid. Of course I’ll come, you need a swordsman.”

“I could ask Aveline-”

“She’s not going to get up in the middle of the night to help us commit crime. Come on, what door was it?”

“There is supposed to be a mark on - ah here it is!” Hawke had stopped in front of the door to a small hovel that looked completely unremarkable if not for the small mark had been scratched over the stoop in chalk, easily recognizable to anyone who had done a stint in one of Kirkwall’s smuggling rings. Hawke and Carver hung back, letting Varric and Isabela check the door for traps. 

“Here,” Varric muttered, bent low next to the doorframe. Isabela pulled out a small, thin blade, teasing it along the small crack between door’s hinges until she found the edges of a hidden pressure plate. “Ugh, who are these amateurs? A child could’ve disabled this,” she said. The plate let out a faint click and a hiss as it was disabled, and Isabela gave Hawke a wink as she slid the blade back into her boot. Hawke grinned back while Carver rolled his eyes at the both of them. He was pretty sure they were sleeping together, and he wasn’t sure he liked it. Oh, he liked Isabela well enough, that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that if given the choice between a new ship and Marian’s wellbeing, Isabela would not pick Marian. And he feared that his sister, who always thought the very best of people, would not see that particular betrayal coming, and earn a dagger in the back for her optimism. 

“See, Carver? No trouble at all”, Hawke said, before turning the handle and pushing the door open right into a group of heavily armed men. 

For one moment the armed men just stared at Hawke in surprise, but then the spell broke and the man closest to them drew his sword with a roar. He was quick, but Hawke was quicker: the blade slid against the edge of a conjured barrier as the man’s shirt suddenly caught fire. He screamed, and the sword clattered against the dirty stone floor. 

“You were saying?” Carver yelled, and shoulder-checked one attacker to the floor before drawing his own blade. He went charging past Hawke, falling into his usual position of covering Hawke’s side as she set their attacker’s aflame. The fight was almost over before it started, the cramped quarters making it difficult for their opponents' larger numbers to overwhelm them, whilst making it very easy for Hawke, Isabela and Varric to pick enemies off from a distance.

“So that was anticlimactic”, Varric observed. Hawke was frowning too, looking down at the charred bodies at her feet. Isabela shrugged and bent down to start picking through their pockets for any spare loot. 

“You don’t think it’s a bit...unkind to rob corpses?” Hawke asked as Isabela tossed her a handful of coins.

“It’s not like they’re going to need them”.

“Still. It seems...immoral somehow”.

“Oh, my sweet summer child,” Isabela teased. “It is a miracle you’ve lasted so long in this den of depravity we call a city”

“I’m a child, huh? Then you must be very depraved indeed”, Hawke replied with a laugh. Carver sighed. This night really wasn’t getting any better. “Let’s just get Anso’s cargo and get out of here so we can get paid. It’s not our fault he overestimated these smugglers”, he said, moving towards the large trunk in the middle of the room. Normally, he would have waited for Varric’s nod of approval before touching anything that would so obviously be booby-trapped, but the lid was already slightly ajar, probably knocked loose in the fighting. Carver carefully peered inside, fully ready to jump back in case anything came flying out. But the trunk was empty. 

“Dammit,” he said.

“It’s empty?” Hawke asked.

“Of course it is,” Varric said. “A job this easy would have been a clear break from the established narrative. I expect we will be ambushed the second we walk out into the courtyard.”

They were ambushed the second they walked out into the courtyard. 

“Oh for fuck’s sake”, Carver exclaimed. Hawke and Isabela snickered behind him. At least ten mercenaries were standing in the courtyard, ready to attack. They didn’t, though. Not yet.

“Well, this is awkward”, Hawke said in a light, charming voice. “Are we late to the party?” She could tell by the way they carried themselves that this group would be far more of a challenge than the one in the hovel. 

A woman in heavy armour pushed her way to the front. “That’s not the elf”, she snapped, gesturing at Hawke. “Who are they?”

“My grandfather on my father’s side was elven, actually,” Hawke said helpfully.

“Oh, really? I didn’t know that,” Varric said, feeling around for the notebook he’d taken to carrying on him at all times, since Hawke and her companions seemed to endlessly generate the type of outlandish stories that made his stories fly off the shelves. It helped that none of them seemed to have any basis for what constituted normal behaviour. Just last month Isabela had instigated a knife fight at the annual Saturnalia Children’s Festival, and a week after that Anders had tricked Carver into drinking poison in order to “monitor the symptoms properly”. Carver had, after getting the antidote, been weirdly okay with it. And Varric couldn’t even get started on Merrill...

“Well, father lost contact with him long before either of us were born, but I do like to think it’s where I got my gracefulness," Hawke said. A few of the mercenaries exchanged looks. They weren’t used to getting ignored like this.

“You should’ve told me. I think that might play really well with my audience, gives you a bit of an exotic touch.”

Carver snorted. “Gracefulness? You set your own hair on fire once. You should put that in your stories, Varric.” 

“That was one time! And I was twelve”, Hawke protested. Isabela laughed, and casually twirled a knife around her fingers. A few of the mercenaries eyed her cautiously. 

“It wasn’t even a spell gone wrong, she just leaned too close to a candle at dinner-” Carver started. 

“Shut the fuck up!” The heavily armoured woman had run out of the very little patience that she had. “Who the hell are you people?”

“We are just honest smuggler’s out on a job. Nothing to do with you, really, so I think we should all just go our separate ways” Hawke said with a winning smile. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see some of the men moving to block the exits. Ah, probably not amenable to talking this out then. Hawke could usually tell when people were on the fence about it, and a kind smile and some well-chosen words were often the only thing needed to nudge them over to the right side. But this group had already decided, and there was nothing to be done about it. Hawke let four barriers form around herself and her companions, thin as whispers for now, but ready to turn strong as steel with the flick of a finger.

“It doesn’t matter”, one of the men answered. “We were told to kill whoever enters that house.” Hawke could hear the small ‘plink’ that was Varric taking the safety of Bianca. Isabela shifted into fighting position. “I aim to follow my orders; you’ll do the same unless you want to end up on Danarius’s slab”. 

“Ah, I think we can offer an alternative”, Isabela said, and with that cue, Hawke slammed her staff into the ground, the shockwave sending the closest five mercernaries stumbling back. And then the fight began in earnest. 

Since coming to Kirkwall, Hawke had discovered that she was rather good at this whole fighting business. Her whole world concentrated into the next step, the next swing of a blade, the next spell already forming around her hands. She pivoted just in time for one of Varric’s bolts to hit an enemy in the chest, and hit another attacker in the face with her staff.. It was easy, it was clear. Hawke always knew exactly what to do, where to step to avoid the arrows and blades coming her way. She had been right, this group was more skilled than the last, but Hawke’s magic had taken them by surprise, and now they were scrambling to rework their tactics which left obvious gaps in their defense that Isabela and Varric quickly exploited. 

Soon, only the Captain remained. The man stumbled towards the steps leading out of the Alienage, up to Lowtown. Hawke stalked after him, glowing with fury. 

“I think I have had just about enough of pointless killing for tonight,” her voice cracked like thunder. “You are going to explain yourself, now! Who are you after? Who is this Danarius? I’ve never heard of him before, but I’d sure like to before I have to kill more of his mercenaries”. 

For a second it wasn’t a person standing there, but something else, something dangerous and ancient. The captain looked at her with wild, terrified eyes.

“I d- I don’t know who you are, girl. But you’ve made a serious mistake coming here”, he said. 

“I don’t think we’re the ones who’ve made mistakes today”, Hawke responded with a pointed look towards the dead men around her. 

The captain took another few steps back. “Lieutenant!” He called, eyes still locked on Hawke, as if convinced she would pounce at any moment. “I want everyone in the clearing. Now!”

“How much reinforcements do these arseholes have?”. Isabela tried to sound nonchalant, but Hawke could hear the fatigue in her voice, and knew Varric was not faring much better. Carver seemed alright still, but Hawke wasn’t sure that they would be able to protect both their tired companions and themselves in a prolonged attack such as this. No, Hawke would need to let go of her form (just a little, just a bit) and finish this quickly. She could already feel the prickling of raw power, like chalk and blood, building at the back of her teeth. 

But no reinforcements came.

“Your men are dead, and your trap has failed” a deep voice said. A man appeared out of the shadows, his footsteps as silent as the night. “I suggest you run back to your master while you still can”. The man was an elf. A tall, white-haired elf clad in the spikiest, most intricate armour Hawke had ever seen. 

“You’re going nowhere, slave!” The captain said, which turned out to be the final mistake in a long line of mistakes he had committed that night, because the elf whirled around and plunged his entire fist into the man’s rib cage.

“I am not a slave”, the elf snarled. The man’s rib cage buckled inward, splintering into shards as his heart was violently removed from his chest. The man dropped to the floor, forgotten. 

The elf, whose name was Fenris, looked up to find the mercenaries Anso hired staring at him. There were four of them, three humans and a dwarf. Their armour was practical rather than showy, worn from frequent use, and they all carried their weapons with ease. Experienced fighters obviously, all of them. Well, that could be of use. 

“I apologize for the trouble”, he said. “When I asked Anso to provide a distraction for the hunters, I had no idea they’d be so…numerous.”

“Oh, don’t worry. We do this sort of thing often”, Hawke replied. She absentmindedly tried to smooth out her hair. It had grown out a bit since her disastrous attempt at cutting it herself, and Hawke liked to think that it didn’t look nearly as bad anymore. 

“...Impressive”, the elf replied. 

“But if you could fill us in on what exactly is going on, that would be great, thanks”, Varric interjected. He had taken out his notebook again, and was scribbling furiously.

“Well, I suppose you deserve as much. My name is Fenris. These men were Imperial bounty hunters seeking to recover a magister’s lost property—namely myself. They were trying to lure me into the open. Crude as their methods were, I could not face them alone. Thankfully, Anso chose wisely.”

“Well, subterfuge aside I’m happy I helped”, Hawke said brightly.

Fenris gives her a long, evaluating look. “Would you be happy to help out even more?”

_________

And that is how Hawke finds herself breaking into a Hightown mansion in the middle of the night with an elf she’s known for about ten minutes. She had enough sense to realise that this is probably not one of the best decisions she’d ever made, but hey, doing huge and potentially violent favours to strangers had generally paid off so far. 

Hawke tried not to stare at the tall, white-haired elf who walked beside her. She had met many interesting, fascinating people since their arrival in Kirkwall but this one might top them all. Too bad he was about as sociable as a bear with a toothache. Hawke had pulled out all of her best tricks and nicest smiles, and had yet to get more than one word answers out of the man, and even Hawke knew she was pushing it. 

“Not the most sociable person in the world, is he?” Varric muttered as Hawke fell back to let Fenris take the lead. 

“But very easy on the eyes”. Isabela said. She had so far, true to form, managed to direct at least three innuendos and five overt come-ons towards Fenris, who was refusing to engage with any of it. 

Hawke gave both of her friends a grateful smile. Once they had caught their breaths back at the alienage, it had been easy to convince Isabela and Varric to follow along, as Isabela was always up for the chance to rob rich people, whilst Varric had simply nodded and launched into a slightly incoherent monologue about “the sixth ranger” which no one but him had been able to follow. Carver had also agreed readily, and had then spent the better part of the long walk to Hightown glaring daggers at the back of Fenris’s head. 

Carver had a really bad feeling about this, about him. Their other friends did not entirely understand why Carver was so overprotective of his big sister, why he insisted on coming on every job his sister took despite his loud protests or why he followed doggedly at her heels. Varric and Isabela teased him about it sometimes, saying that maybe he should get over his “little brother-syndrome”. Aveline and Anders had made oblique comments about how he should maybe try to strike out on his own a bit more. Merrill hadn’t said anything, but Merrill seemed barely aware that she was in Kirkwall most of the time. Carver knew he was overprotective. Carver also knew, probably better than anyone, that his sister was the last person in the world who actually needed to be protected. Carver just couldn’t shake the fear that one day Marian’s charm and quick spells would fail her - and Carver would be alone. Losing Bethany had been like losing a limb, like being ripped in half and sewn back together. He refused to let that happen again - even if it meant following along on all of his sister’s more foolhardy quests. 

___________

From the outside the manor looked exactly like any other residence in Hightown. I.e. it had large windows, was way bigger than it had to be and exuded a general air of superiority. But as they got closer the mansion gave off another, very different, feeling as well. The house was soaked to the bones in dark magic that came rolling of it like waves. Blood magic, almost certainly, and all the gruesome horrors and demons that came with it. Hawke felt almost seasick just looking at it, and a quick look at Carver confirmed that he felt it too. 

The door was just as severe and unwelcoming as the rest of the place. It was also proving impossible to breach. “Well, I give up”, Varric announced, giving the door a sharp kick for good measure, and then produced three kinds of screwdrivers, seemingly out of thin air. “Should we try to take the hinges off?”

“It wouldn’t work”, Fenris growled. He had become more and more agitated, resorting to pacing back and forth behind them. “If I know Danarius right, that door is sealed with magic.”

“The door is not the only entrance to a house”. Isabela was giving the large, high windows a contemplative look. “I could easily climb that. Here, Carver, give me a boost.” 

“Have you tried knocking?” Hawke asked.

“Have I...no I haven’t tried knocking”, Varric said. Fenris stopped his pacing for a moment to look at Hawke like he was trying to determine if she was insane or just stupid. 

“I don’t think we’re going to be invited in for tea, sweetie,” Isabela said from her spot halfway up the rafters.

Hawke shrugged, reached out a hand, and knocked. There was a beat, and then the door swung open by itself. 

“...huh”, Isabela said, after a few moments of stunned silence. “I’ll have to try that in the future.” 

The doorway opened up to a dark, endless corridor. The magic was even more evident now, drawing, pulling them in. The house was greedy, hungry for more victims to pull in through its gaping fangs. 

Hawke gnawed at her own lower lip, and gave Fenris a quick, concerned glance. She tried to avoid using magic around new people until they’d got to know each other enough that it would be unlikely for them to sell her out to the templars. But if they were going to have even the slightest fighting chance against an actual Tevinter magister - Hawke would have to use magic, and probably a lot of it. Hawke was also smart enough to deduce that Fenris, a former slave of said Tevinter magister who had used him as a guinea pig for magical experiments, probably didn’t hold mages in particularly high regard. 

Hawke sighed. Well. hopefully assisting Fenris in killing his former master would help mitigate the fact that Hawke was herself a mage.

“We should tread very carefully”, Hawke said. “This place is might be covered in magical tra-”

“Danarius! Come out and face me!” Fenris stormed past Hawke into the dim mansion with his sword already drawn.

“...Or not”

“Well, so much for the element of surprise”, Varric said dryly.

“Where are you, master?” Fenris’s voice could be heard from inside the house.. Several bangs and the sound of breaking glass followed. 

“Oh, come on, we better go help him”, Hawke said, stepping through the door and into the dark, hungry house. The other three followed her cautiously, weapons at the ready. The house was quiet and seemingly empty, though a number of wall sconces were still lit, and a fire was still smoldering in the empty kitchen. People were still here, or at least had been very recently. 

They caught up with Fenris in the next room, which looked to be a library. A glyph had been inscribed on the floor right in front of the door to the main hall, blocking his way. Fenris was staring furiously at it, as if he could dispel it solely with the power of an angry glare. 

“Want some help with that?” Hawke said in a mild voice, like she was talking to a fussy child. 

“I’ll handle it. You take the ones by the window”, Carver interjected before Fenris had the chance to answer, pushing past his sister and dispelling the glyph with a quick wave of his hand. The ones by the windows didn’t present much of a challenge either. Was this really the best this magister could do? Or was it just a diversion, designed to lull them into a false sense of safety? 

Fenris frowned at Carver. “How did you do that? Are you a templar? A mage?”

“Nah, I’m just-” Carver started. 

And then all the lights went out at once.

“That’s not good,” Isabela murmured, stating the obvious. Hawke blinked frantically, trying to force her eyes to adjust to the darkness faster. They all drew closer to one another, guarding each others’ backs if need be. The room suddenly filled with the scent of ozone, and Hawke knew exactly what that meant. 

“Demons!” she hissed, just as a swirling mess of shadow started to grow out of the floor. The shadows were alive, writhing and clawing themselves into existence with a crackle of electricity. Shades. Hawke _hated_ shades.

Fenris growled, and cut the head of the first demon, just as soon as it formed. The others feel into fighting soon after, cutting down wave after wave of the enemies. Isabela stabbed a rage demon in the face, and then rolled out of the way as it exploded into a ball of flames. She could feel the heat of it against her skin, only stopped by the barrier Hawke had produced at the last second. 

Shades had no weapons, no armour, no tactics, barely smarter than animals. But they were strong, and they kept coming. Mindlessly attacking anything that wasn’t demonic. And there were so many of them. By the time one of them had fallen to a blade or an arrow another one had taken its place. And they just _kept coming._

“In here! Come on!”. Fenris flung open the doors to the main hall, and they all stumbled through it. Hawke was the last one out, slamming the door behind her and sealing the shades behind them with the strongest glyphs she knew of. Scratches and growls could be heard through the door, but the glyph held. At least for now. 

This room was even darker than the other parts of the house, every candle extinguished and the large windows blocked off from the moonlight outside. It was a large room, you could tell by the echo of their footsteps and the contours of the high vaulted ceiling and large windows. Hawke, having abandoned every pretense of not being a mage, snapped her fingers three times and all the wall scones and the large fireplace came to life with fire, illuminating the room they were now standing in. 

The main hall was covered with the very obvious signs of a large battle. Blood spattered the walls almost up to the ceiling, and made the floor slippery. Corpses littered the floor.Most of them looked human, although some of them had a very disconcerting number of limbs. The only thing close to this carnage Carver had ever seen was at Ostagar, but there he had been so focused on staying alive to properly take it in. Here, there was no such distraction, there was nothing to do but watch. 

“Looks like they had the fight without us. How rude of them,” Varric joked, but his voice lacked the usual humour. The drawn out fighting and late hours was getting to him. It was getting to Isabela too, Hawke could tell even though they both tried to hide it. 

“They’ve been dead for hours, even days by the looks of it”, Isabela said as she gingerly poked one of the more mauled cadavers with the edge of a knife.

“Yeah, that’s...that’s not really a positive in this situation”, Hawke said with a grimache. The corpse next to her looked bloated and grotesque, but she could still make out what looked like long, broken claws on a few of its tattered fingers. Hopefully it would not get another chance to use those. 

“Why?” Isabela said, in a voice that made it obvious that she really did not want to hear the answer. 

“Because the magister who lives here is obviously a blood mage, something that Fenris somehow neglected to tell us”, Carver said. 

“It’s fine, Carver. We’ll figure it out”, Hawke tried, but Fenris had already taken the bait. 

“Do you have something to say to me?” 

“You should have fucking told us!” Carver was gripping the hilt of his sword as hard as he could, but his hands were with blood and kept slipping. 

“I had to act quickly. He is getting away!” Fenris yelled back. “This is my chance to end it all, to finally kill him.”

“And you had to drag us into it?!”

Fenris didn’t bother to respond - he bolted up the grand staircase towards the room at the top.

“No, wait!” Hawke shouted and set off after him. If there ever was a trap in this house, that door would be it. But Fenris had taken the steps two at the time and all but kicked the door open, sending it crashing into the wall with a loud bang. 

There was a horrible sound behind them. It sounded like a dying, choked-out gasp, like nails dragged over stone, like bones breaking and flesh being torn over and over and over. 

And then the corpses started moving. 

“What the fuck?” Isabela yelled, giving voice to what they were all thinking. Hawke cursed herself. She knew this was going to happen, she’d known it as soon as she’d laid eyes on this cursed house, and she should have stopped Fenris from setting off the trap. She could have done it. She could have reached Fenris in time if she’d only not been stupid enough to care about what they would think of her, what Fenris would think of her. What they would think if she’d suddenly moved faster than any human should be capable of. Stupid, stupid, _stupid._ Hawke threw herself back down the stairs, Fenris close behind, weapons at the ready. 

The walking dead were strong, and they hit hard, and they did not tire or feel pain or fear or anything that may have slowed down a real person. They did not defend themselves, but they also didn’t need to. They shrugged off sharp shards of ice and arrows like pinpricks, and the marred skin might as well have been made of steel for all the damage blades did to it. Hawke’s barriers were working overtime, protecting them all from the worst of it. But it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly enough. And she couldn’t keep it up forever. Carver wasn’t faring much better. A blow connected with his shoulder, and it might as well have been a hammer for the way it made his entire arm go numb. If his armour had been thinner it would have broken his shoulder. He stumbled backwards, swinging his sword in a wide arch to get some distance between himself and the enemy. 

Their howling, rasping voices were hard to ignore. Their jaws and throats working compulsively, trying to form words that would never come, but only resulted in a terrible screeching that made Hawke’s ears ring. Taking advantage of her distraction, several of the cursed creatures threw themselves at Hawke at once. Her own shield shattered around her, sending sharp shards of magic through the closest attackers. A sudden sharp pain lanced across the side of her ribs, and her hands came away from it wet with blood. 

Hawke would not die here. She would not allow anyone else to die here. She gritted her teeth, and made a decision. 

A shockwave threw the closest corpses back, and Hawke threw herself down to, using her own blood, paint a jagged half circle on the floor.

“Get behind me, and don’t move!” Hawke bellowed, pointing to the half circle in the corner. Everyone except Fenris, who hadn’t learnt to always do whatever Hawke told them to when she used that particular voice, did just that. 

“Fenris. Fenris, stop!” But Fenris didn't stop. He did not even seem to hear her. 

“Fenris, if you don’t stay still you will die” Hawke tried again. Fenris ignored her, going low to cut the legs out from under the corpse of a armoured soldier. It went down, but did not stop moving. 

Hawke clamped a surprisingly strong hand around his shoulder, and shoved Fenris behind her, almost sending him chrasing straight into Carver. Fenris whipped around but the rage died in his throat. 

Pure, blinding light was streaming out of Hawke’s hands, brighter and stronger than the sun itself. Her skin rolled, turning into wings, into stars, into fangs. She was, at that moment, the most beautiful thing Fenris had ever seen. 

Trying to remember it later, the only way Varric could find to describe it was that of standing in the eye of a very localized thunderstorm. A shade lunged itself at the shield, close enough that Varric could look straight into the creature’s eye as it was disintegrated. The air filled with the smell of magic, of ozone, as bright, bright flames danced through the air to immolate everything outside of the conjured barrier. And at the center of the storm there was Hawke, the light enveloping her from the inside out, the amber of her eyes replaced with pure fire. 

She was beautiful and wonderful and utterly _terrifying_. 

And then, just as sudden as it had started, the light faded, leaving the five of them standing in the darkness. The only evidence that the walking corpses had ever been there was a series of scorch marks along the marble floor. The room was quiet. 

“Well, I’m glad that’s over,” Hawke said casually, as if she hadn’t just revealed herself to have abilities far beyond anything previously shown. As if she hadn’t just revealed herself to be the most powerful person in the entire city. “You guys okay?”

“We? Are you okay?”, Varric asked.

Fenris made an annoyed sound, and sidled towards the master study again, and began to rifle through the contents of the large desk within. Varric noticed Fenris took a great deal of care in always keeping Hawke in his line of sight as he did so. 

Hawke gave him a wan smile. “Oh yes, just a bit tired now”. Her complexion had gone from pale to ashen. 

Fenris came stalking back down the stairs, his entire body radiating with tension and anger, and barely gave them all a glance before storming out of the house. 

“I guess that’s our cue to leave,” Carver muttered. “Unless you want to rob the place first? Isabela?”

“No yeah, the sooner we get the fuck out of here the better,” Isabela said.

“Oh, are you sure? We could wait-” Hawke started saying, before being interrupted by Varric, Isabela and Carver collectively dragging her out of the building. 

________________________

Fenris was, surprisingly, waiting for them outside. 

“Are you okay?” Hawke asked.

“It never ends,” Fenris said accusingly. “I escaped a land of dark magic only to have it hunt me at every turn. And now I find myself in the company of yet another mage. I should have realised sooner what you were.” 

“Ah, don’t blame yourself. Very few people know of my magic unless I want them too,” Hawke said casually. “Though I do owe you an apology for not telling you earlier. I am sorry if it startled you.”

This made Fenris pause for a moment. He’d never had a mage apologise to him before.

“I would appreciate it if you didn’t speak of what I am to anyone else though”, Hawke continued. "The Chantry tends to get a bit tetchy about magic around these parts."

Fenris gave her a suspicious look. “Tell me then, what manner of mage are you? What is it you seek?”

“At the moment I’d really like to go to bed actually. Or did you mean more in general? I’m just trying to get by, Fenris”.

“Yet I have seen many crimes done in the name of survival”: 

“Well, my sister just risked her life helping you. So maybe you should try being a bit more grateful”, Carver snapped.

“I’m sure that’s not how he meant it”, Hawke said, giving Fenris way more credit than he himself felt that he deserved. 

“No, your brother is right. I don’t mean to appear ungrateful, and I should apologize. Nothing is further from the truth. I did not find Danarius, obviously, but I still owe you a debt.”

“Aw, don’t worry about it”, Hawke said.

“I intend to repay my debts. If you ever need assistance, feel free to call on me.”

“So you intend to stick around?” Hawke sounded delighted by this prospect. Fenris had no idea how to interpret that, so he ignored it. 

“I am done running. Danarius will never stop hunting me, and I can appreciate the advantage of a well known battle ground.”

Varric, who always knew when there was more to the story, said: “Seems like a lot of men and money wasted on capturing just one slave. What’s to say he doesn’t cut his losses and stays in Tevinter?”

“It’s not me he’s after, it’s this”, Fenris gestured to his throat, where twin strands of gleaming tattoos ran down into his breastplate. “It’s pure lyrium running through my skin. Probably worth more than half the mansions in this town. My former master sunk way too much of his fortune into this experiment to let me run off, even if he has to rip it from my corpse”. 

“Seems like a waste of a perfectly handsome elf”, Hawke replied with a grin. Fenris giggled, and then immediately looked utterly betrayed for having done so. Carver let out a loud groan. 

“I think that’s the blood loss talking, Mari. Let’s go home.”

“What? This is just a scratch”, Hawke tried to protest, but still went willingly when her brother started to herd her away. 

“I’ll see you soon! Get some rest!” she yelled, waving at Fenris over her shoulder.

__________________________________

Fenris was a light sleeper, and had grown even more so during his time on the run. It was difficult to find any true peace when he had to be ready to fight or flee at a moment’s notice. And the dreams certainly didn’t help, filled with pain and fear.  
But that first night in the manor he dreams of a wolf running through an open field, chasing a large bird. The bird soars through the air, low enough for the wolf to touch, but somehow always just out of reach.

The wolf snaps after the bird, but the bird skillfully evades the sharp teeth and soars higher and higher until it is just a shadow against the bright sun. He can hear a woman’s bright, tinkering laugh echo from somewhere far away. 

And Fenris wakes up with sunlight streaming through the windows, feeling truly rested for the first time in years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for all the comments and kudos! Love you.
> 
> Also, the whole ”my sweet summer child” is obviously from GOT, but I feel like its almost part of the common vernacular at this point?


	7. Little Talks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Merrill gets to know her new friend

“Will you visit me?” Merrill asks. “Not now, of course, but later? I could use a friend here in Kirkwall.”

“Of course I will,” Hawke answered. “I’ll visit as much as you want.” And for the first time in a long time, Merrill thinks that she might genuinely have made a new friend. 

Too bad her new friend isn’t at all what she is pretending to be. 

Too bad her new friend is deliberately trying to avoid talking about it. 

___________

The first time Hawke visits Merrill’s small hovel a familiar feeling fills the room as soon as she steps through the open door. It’s the smell of magic, of spirits and the Fade. It prickles through the humid air like lingering electricity after a spell, and Merrill almost jerks back at the feel of it. Hawke doesn’t seem to notice though, too busy asking Merrill a million of concerned questions about how she finds the city and happily chattering about how ‘Kirkwall really isn’t so bad once you’ve given it a try and word has gotten around that robbing you would be a serious health hazard’. 

Kirkwall had been overwhelming and chaotic at first, like nothing Merill had ever experienced before. She could feel the power underneath, deep and dark and waiting, moving underneath her feet. A city built on stone and shadows and blood.

The old altars of the Tevinter Imperium may have been long gone, destroyed during one of the many slave rebellions, but they could still be felt, unseen, wrapped all around the city, great endless wells of time and power and magic. Just waiting for someone to come along with the right words and the right power to draw it out. This should make Merrill feel uneasy, but it doesn’t. It makes her feel like she belongs.

Ever since Merrill’s clan had crossed the waters from Ferelden into the Free Marches she had felt a pull from deep within her bones. It had grown stronger and stronger the closer they got to Kirkwall, and by the time they’d reached Sundermount, Merrill was absolutely certain that something was calling to her in the great city of chains. When she had explained all this to her Keeper, Marethari had not been surprised at all. “We all have different paths to walk in life, child, and this seems to be yours”, she had said. 

And then, only a few days later, a woman named Hawke had strolled up to her on a sunny afternoon in the mountains with a full head of dark curls, an easy smile and magic rolling of her skin like waves. And just like that, Merrill had known that this human was meant to walk down that path with her. 

Hawke was also not at all what Merrill had expected. For someone who carried such a deep shadow within themselves, Merrill had almost expected her to be cold and ruthless, perhaps even cruel. But Hawke wasn’t any of those things. 

No, Hawke was warm, and kind and honest in a way that made Merrill feel like she had a real friend for the first time since Tamlen and Mahariel left the tribe. And Hawke was patient too. Merrill had always been a bit scatter-brained, she knew that, but these days she sometimes had trouble keeping track of more than one thought at the same time, but unlike her clansfolk Hawke never expressed any impatience or frustrations with Merrill’s distracted ramblings. Rather, Hawke had a way of listening that made it seem like whatever Merrill had to say was the most interesting thing in the world. 

And so naturally Merrill finds herself spending multiple hours discussing which bakery makes the best honeycomb bread, the intricacies of the Darktown alley system and which taverns to avoid unless you don’t mind eating rat disguised as beef. Merrill doesn’t even realise there was something else she was meant to ask about until it is well past midnight and Hawke is bidding her goodbye in the doorway. She’ll come around soon again anyway, right? Hawke had promised, after all, and Hawke did not seem like the type to break a promise, although one could never know with humans. Maybe they didn’t take these things seriously.  
Merrill really hopes she’ll visit again. 

Hawke does visit again, only three days later. And again, and again until spring turns to summer and Merrill can scarcely imagine her life without Hawke in it.

They still haven’t talked about it, though. 

It’s not that Merrill hasn’t tried, but every time Hawke changes the subject so smoothly that Merrill doesn’t realise it’s happening until several hours have passed and Hawke is halfway out the door. 

Merrill can’t tell if Hawke’s doing it on purpose. But surely Hawke has to know that she knows, right? Maybe she’s waiting for the right moment to bring it up? Or perhaps she expects Merrill to ask? But then why would she change the subject every time?  
She should just come out and ask next time. Even Hawke wouldn’t be able to avoid a straight question, right?

As it turns out, Hawke doesn’t need too.

__________________________________

“We’re so close to having all the money needed for the expedition!” Hawke says, her eyes shining with excitement as she practically bounces through Merrill’s door. “Well, pretty close. We are close enough that I’m fairly sure I won’t have to take Isabela up on her offer to help me rob Seneschal Bran’s house.”

“Oh, that’s so great!” Merrill says. “And stealing isn’t a very nice thing to do. I would hate for you to have to do that.”

“Me too. And of course mother would kill me if she ever found out”. Leandra Hawke had very strong and specific opinions on what crimes were morally acceptable that in most instances didn’t line up, or even overlap, with the actual law. Smuggling for example was completely fine in Leandra’s eyes, as it only negatively affected tax collectors, who were barely considered ‘people’, much less victims. Murder and general acts of violence were justifiable as long as you didn’t start it, and stealing was fine in desperate circumstances, but breaking and entering was considered “gauche” and thus completely unacceptable.

“I’d hate to see you get arrested. But of course you wouldn’t get arrested. You’re much too talented for that. And Aveline wouldn’t arrest you, she likes you. Isabela never gets arrested and Aveline doesn’t even like her- Oh, I’m sorry, I’m rambling aren’t I?” 

“Well, yes but I don’t see why you need to apologise for that”, Hawke says, sounding slightly confused, like she couldn’t even imagine that rambling could be considered annoying. “I don’t think you’re entirely correct about that, though. Aveline would love to arrest Isabela. I hear it’s even on her Nameday wishlist”.

“Really?”

“Oh yes. She showed it to me and everything.” Varric had even offered to frame Isabela for some minor crime, just enough to get her arrested but not get in any real legal trouble, and had received a two-hour lecture on the importance of due process in return. There had been actual diagrams involved. Varric was still traumatised.

“Oh, but Isabela is so nice! And she doesn’t hurt almost anyone. Well, she hurts some people obviously, but those people aren’t very nice”, Merrill said, sounding slightly worried. Despite being possibly the least maternal person in Thedas, Isabela had taken Merrill under her slightly grubby wings almost immediately, which meant that Merrill’s estimation of Isabela’s character was vastly higher than most people’s. 

“I think it’s mostly the stealing that bothers Aveline,” Hawke mused, unwrapping the sweet buns she’d brought with her. “Though I don’t see why. Stealing is practically Kirkwall’s national sport. And Isabela hardly ever steals from people who can’t afford it.” 

“Can Seneschal Bran afford it, do you think?” Merrill started to get a niggling feeling that there was something she was forgetting.

“Judging by the size of his house I really should think so,” Hawke said reassuringly.

“I never understood why someone would choose to live in such a huge house all by himself”, Merrill said. What was it she was forgetting? Had she forgotten to put out the fire in the stove again? No, that wasn’t it. 

“Perhaps he has a whole bunch of very quiet roommates?”

“Oh! Do you think so?” Wasn’t she supposed to say something? Why did she always forget these things?

“...Well, maybe. I’ll ask the next time I see him,” Hawke promises. And Hawke would actually ask. Merrill really liked that about Hawke. She was very unusual that way. Oh, right! Unusual - that was it!

“I want us to look at my mirror”, Merrill blurts out.

Hawke blinks. “What, this mirror?”.

“Yes, that mirror.”

Hawke looked at the mirror like it’s the first time she’s seen it, which is frankly a bit ridiculous. The eluvian takes up almost half the floor space in Merrill’s small combined living room and kitchen, and one has to be careful not to make any sudden turns lest they smack themselves in the face with it when moving around the room. What other mirror could she possibly be referring to?

“Perhaps a bit...ostentatious considering the rest of the decor?” Hawke says.

“It does stand out a bit, I suppose. But that’s not really-”

“Or perhaps just ambitious? Planning on making it big and buying a manor to match, eh?” Hawke teases, making Merrill giggle.

“It’s actually not really a mirror. Well, it is, but it’s a special mirror. It’s called an eluvian, and-” .

A loud, terrified scream suddenly echoed through the alienage, followed by the kind of bone-chilling gurgle that could only be a demon. Hawke was up and out the door before Merrill even had time to react. She hesitated for a few seconds, and then pulled out her staff and followed. Hawke had already disappeared down into the mess of narrow alleys that made up the majority of the alienage, but the loud bangs and shouts were easy to follow.

“Oh, thank Mythal! Get it away from me, please!” a voice yelled from one of the doors on the far left. Inside, a man Merrill recognised in passing from the market was scrambling up a rickety bookcase in order to get away from a minor rage demon.

“Oh, hello Serah Vardan. How nice to meet you again”, Hawke said. Merrill never stopped being astonished by how Hawke seemed to be on first-name basis with at least half of Kirkwall’s population.

“It won’t listen to me! You have to help” the man on the bookshelf yelled.

“I thought we had talked about this, Vardan”, said Hawke in the tone of a mildly disapproving school teacher. The demon made an angry gurgling sound and tried to drag itself higher. It seemed unaware of Hawke’s and Merrill’s presence, single-minded in its pursuit, and it moved like having a body, let alone limbs, was a completely new experience. Not a very powerful demon then, which was a relief. 

“What?” He gave the demon a sharp kick and scrambled higher up on the bookshelf, which creaked loudly. 

“Oh, you don’t remember? We met just three months ago. Very similar situation, as I recall.”

“Yes, yes, of course I remember. Just kill it!”

“You can’t just keep summoning demons because you don’t get along with your landlord”, said Hawke. “I feel like I was very clear on that last time.”

“Really? For something like that?” said Merrill.

“Yep,” said Hawke. “Fortunately, it was only a small fear demon that time. But seeing as Vardan here isn’t a mage, and also doesn’t know anything about how to bind a demon: it naturally backfired on him. Who sold you the summoning runes this time? Was it Elspeth in Darktown?”

“You don’t understand!” the elf cried. “She’s always on my case about the rent, and the mess and the noise. It’s very opress- oh, Maker!” The demon’s long fingers closed around the elf’s ankle and started dragging him down from his refuge.

“Oh, no you don’t!”, Hawke admonished.

“Rrrrrr?” said the demon. It had never been summoned before, and was frankly not having a good time with it. 

“Be a good spirit now and let go of him”, Hawke said. The demon cocked its head. It let go of the squirming elf, and shrunk back down to the floor like a guilty puppy. 

“Thank you very much!,” Hawke beamed. “Vardan, say thank you to the nice spirit.” 

“...Thanks?” Vardan gave Merrill the kind of look that elves often share in the company of humans, and which generally means something like ‘Can you believe this fucking shemlen?”.

Hawke turned towards the demon: “Now, would you like to go home?” The demon made an ugly wheezing noise that Hawke seemed to interpret as affirmative.”Good. Listen very carefully: For this to work you have to really want it.” The demon did really rather want to go home. It had been minding its own business in its usual corner of the Fade with only some light plans to maybe haunt someone’s dream later, and then it had been unceremoniously dragged into this strange realm where nothing looked or felt right. 

“What are you going to do?” Merrill asked.

“I’m helping” Hawke says simply. “You should step back a little, sometimes there is a bit of a splash zone”. She rolled up her sleeves and aimed a naked palm in the demon’s direction. 

Merrill started to feel a bit nervous. Hawke’s staff was nowhere to be seen, probably still propped up between the stove and the door in Merriill’s house. Was Hawke seriously intending to banish a demon with her bare hands? 

“Hawke, you can’t do this without the proper ritual….Can you?” The walls around the Fade were already thin enough; she’d let other spirits through or worse, become possessed by one of them. 

“Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing” Hawke said, and for a fraction of a second, there is a swirling chaos where her eyes should be. “Remember: you have to want it”. Tendrils of magic started crawling through the air, forming a whirling maelstrom around the small demon. For a moment it looked almost like it was tearing it apart, and then there was a loud whoosing sound, and the creature was gone. 

For a second, the silence was deafening. The magic still hung in the air, thick and metallic like the air after a lightning strike. Merrill was abruptly pulled back to the present by the sound of an armoured fist banging on the door. “Open up! City Guard!”

And just like that, the eldritch whirlpools that had been Hawke’s eyes were snuffed out, the friendly human mask slipping firmly into place by the time the door slid open to reveal a harried-looking Aveline with a templar in tow.

“Thank the maker you’re here”, Hawke exclaimed, pulling Merrill aside to let the trio enter the small room. She casually draped herself against Merrill’s side, obscuring the staff in Merrill’s hand in the process. 

“Oh, hello. What seems to be the problem here?” Aveline asked, far too used to finding Hawke in the middle of a crime scene to even question her presence, and most of the time she was not the actual perpetrator of the crime, which was as good as you could wish for in Kirkwall. 

“We have gotten multiple reports of possible demon summonings in this area,” the templar interjected, brimming with the sort of arrogance only found in newly initiated recruits.

Aveline sighed. “This is Templar-Lieutenant Bryant. He insisted on coming along on this call”. 

“It is far too dangerous for anyone to investigate possible demonic activity by themselves. Especially for a guardsman such as yourself, who is hardly experienced in these matters”, Templar-Lieutenant Bryant said.

“Yes, lucky me”, Aveline said dryly.

“You there! What have you got to say about this?” 

Hawke’s face lit up in such an innocent smile that any templar with an ounce more experience would have been instantly suspicious. “It all happened so fast. It was certainly some kind of monstrous creature, but it was so dark in here that I hardly had any time to see exactly what it was before it attacked.”

“And then what happened? How did you incapacitate it?”

“Oh, it was all terribly scary!” Hawke exclaimed, adding a slight tremor in her voice for effect. Aveline gave her a look that made it clear this was over-selling it. “Um, it was really dark so I couldn’t really see the creature properly before it attacked me, so I just acted on instinct and stabbed it.”

“You stabbed it?” Bryant said, a slight scepticism creeping into his voice. There was something not quite right with this story, but he couldn’t put his finger on it, and would also rather die than admit ignorance.

“Yes, and Vardan helped me”. Vardan nodded enthusiastically. “And then it just made this horrible howl and crumbled into ash.” 

“It crumbled into ash?” 

“Yes, are demons not supposed to do that?” Hawke asked, her face breaking into a sunny smile. 

“No, that sounds...plausible”. Bryant suddenly had a hard time focusing, feeling almost dizzy. The story did not really match up to what they had covered in training, but this Hawke woman had been so forthcoming and polite - surely she wouldn’t lie about something like this? And for what? To protect some foolish elf?

“Anyway, there are clearly signs of illegal activity in this house,” Aveline cut in. “...and as I remember you’re already on probation Serah Vardan”.

“Now wait a minute…” Vardan protested, with an impressive amount of indignation for someone who’d only minutes earlier had tried to hire a demon to murder their landlord. 

“-so I will have to bring you in. You can spend the night in a holding cell, and then you will get questioned in the morning”, Aveline continued. 

Vardan was not the only one taking issue with this: ““The elf summoned a demon, that is clearly templar business”, Bryant said. 

“Mr. Vardan is not a mage, which means this falls under the jurisdiction of the City Guard. Isn’t that right?”

“Completely right, ser! No mages here,” said Vardan, who had weighed his options and decided that the City Guard was far preferable to the Templar’s.

“He summoned a demon…” Bryant tried.

“He did? And where is this demon? Do you have any proof?” Aveline said. Knight-Lieutenant Bryant felt like he was rapidly losing control of the situation. 

“I…”

“As a citizen of Kirkwall Mr. Vardan is entitled to a trial of his peers. Is that something that the templar order can ensure?” The last line had knives in it. 

Guardsman Aveline Vallen and Templar-Lieutenant Bryant stared at each other for several, very long seconds. Bryant blinked first. 

“So do you want help escorting Vardan back to Hightown?” Hawke said politely.

“I would like that, thank you,” Aveline replied.

“You good to get back home on your own, Merrill? Okay, great. So sorry I have to cut my visit short. I’ll see you soon!” 

Well, Merrill thought as she stepped out into the warm summer night, if she wasn’t sure about Hawke before then she certainly was now. 

A lot of people realised that there was _something_ special about Hawke, but few could put their finger on it. Merrill, on the other hand, had suspected it since the second they’d met. But after that display it was almost blindingly obvious.  
Hawke was one of the elgar’dalén. A Godchild.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew, ok. I decided to take this chapter down and re-write it as I wasn't entirely happy with it. I am slightly more ok with it now, though, so hopefully I can move forward with the story now. The next chapter is at least half finished, so it probably won't be too much of a wait. Let me know what you think!


End file.
